Reunions
by robert3A-SN
Summary: In this fic set in the future, Butters is crushed when Wendy is killed in a horrible accident, and when Stan takes his own life soon after. But then the ghost of Wendy appears to ask Butters for help in reuniting her with Stan in the afterlife.
1. Act 1, Scene 1: Tragedy

Author's note: This story set in the future has no relation to my earlier future fic "Celebration" at all. This is an alternate view of the future in my eyes and although it refers to events in my fanfic continuity, it does not have scenes in the present day like Celebration did, so this story is basically a one shot fic and will not count as part of my regular timeline.  
  
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There are all kinds of love in the world. There's the geniune type of love, the love that can be faked to keep up public appearences, and all the sleazy types of love on reality shows. But 17 year old Stan Marsh had nothing to do right now but lie on his bed and on his back, as he was left to think about the kind of love he had. The kind that compelled him to lose his virginity 10 minutes ago, even though it would have been more fitting to do it tomorrow night. Oh well, it wasn't like he could get a time machine and erase what happened- it would be another few years until Dr Mephisto perfected the first time machine. And the other reason he didn't want to go back and stop his innocence from being lost was because he was not an insane person.  
  
Stan had just finished catching his breath as he started at the ceiling. Also, he was trying to get used to actually lying down and relaxing in her bed, where he would stay for most of the night if her mom didn't come back before morning. She wasn't around right now, but the room was surrounded with pictures of her and Stan when they were more appropriatly dressed. It was like they made up a timeline of the progress of their relationship, as they charted their growth from smarter than average 9 year old kids to the point they had reached tonight. Every path they had taken which was a cause for them to take a picture, all those events had led to this final milestone. This was wistful thinking that would have gone on for a while longer if she didn't sneak up behind him and climb back into bed to get his attention. Just one little tap was enough to snap Stan out of it and turn his attention back to the girl- or woman, to be more accurate- who made it possible.  
  
Even after Wendy Testaburger had gotten her boyfriend's attention back to her, she didn't quite know what to say to him. This would be the first conversation they had after they made love, and she was still racking her head to figure out how they just lost control like that. Today was March 14'th, and the 8'th anniversary of their first real kiss was tomorrow, so it would have been more fitting to have their first time on that night, wouldn't it? But for some reason, when she invited him over for a pre anniversary celebration and they started kissing, they seemed to both decide without a word that they couldn't wait anymore. Not after 8 long years of waiting to be old enough to do it. And now that there was no more waiting to be done and they were lying there, naked but completly under Wendy's bed covers, what could they possibly say to capture the aftermath of the moment?  
  
"I guess it was a good decision to buy condoms and forget to take them outta my coat pocket today, huh?" Maybe it wasn't the most lovely saying, but the truth of what Stan said was enough to make them laugh and calm themselves down a bit.  
  
"Well, now that we already did it, we don't have to worry about it tomorrow. Now we can just enjoy our anniversary without this hanging over our heads." Wendy was surprised that she figured that out so quickly, but it really did provide her with some relief. But that was Wendy for you, as Stan figured. She always found the right and intellegent thing to say in any occasion, which really helped in the tight spots he got into when he was a kid. But now that their adventuring days were just about over and they had young adult responsibilites now, they were able to use their gifts in ways that didn't have the fate of the town and the world in the balance. Now all they could do was be a normal couple, and celebrate anniversarys like normal couples as well- and the non sex part of the anniversary was all set for tomorrow.  
  
"So now that this is over, we can get ready for the non sex parts of the anniversary.", Stan repeated. "I'll pick you up at about 5, we'll find some kind of fancy transportation to take us to dinner, we'll eat and dance and then go to Stark's Pond like in the good old days. And now we have two things to celebrate, the annniversary and what we did tonight."  
  
"It sounds just about perfect.", Wendy replied. With those last anxietys destroyed, she snuggled back up to Stan and started to put her hand on his bare chest, rubbing it gently over the places where she had kissed just a half hour ago. Stan was about tempted to start putting his hands over her at this point before one final anxiety of Wendy's quickly returned to her without warning. "Shit!! Butters!!"  
  
"Butters?!" Stan asked in his most confused voice, since it was quite confusing that he would be mentioned at a time like this. But Wendy quickly cleared up the mystery. "I promised Butters I'd tutor him before he had his next math test, but his asshole teacher moved the test forward to the day after tomorrow! That means I have to go over tomorrow to help him with his math problems, shit! How's that gonna interfere with our perfect schedule?!" Wendy started to rack her brain again for a solution to the new problem, until she found the simplest one. "Wait a minute...it doesn't."  
  
Stan got back to being a little confused again until Wendy presented her new revived schedule. "Silly me, there really is nothing to worry about! I was gonna spend the two spare hours I had after school to get ready for our date, but it really shouldn't take me long to dress up. I can come over Butters's house at about a quarter to 4, it should take me about a half hour at the most to set him straight. Then I'll have about 45 minutes to look my best and then we can go out on the town." Once she was done with yet another of her trademark long winded talks, Wendy looked to Stan for his reaction to her plan. He just responsed with, "Cool, dude." but that was enough to finish calming her down. So with that detail taken care of, she went back to lying down and leaning against him.  
  
"Did you ever really think that we'd end up like this, Stan? Discussing altering my schedule for our 8'th anniversary date? I always said we'd be together forever, but I....I guess I sometimes didn't really think it would be a reality. Especially after all the shit we've beaten back." During Wendy's talk, Stan tried to resist thinking about that type of shit in too much detail before he moved on. "I don't know, Wendy. I probably didn't think as much about it as you did. But look at where we are now. We're lying in bed together until your Mom gets back or my Mom notices I snuck out of my room, we just, un, consummated our relationship....and my bare skin is being pressed against the most sexy girl in the world. I'd rather not overanalyze how lucky we are and just enjoy the moment instead."  
  
If he had bothered to analyze it, Stan would have some evidence about how lucky he really was. All those times he puked on her when they first met, all those times he used to ignore her when they were young, and all those times she could have just gotten sick of her and broken up with him before he figured out how to love. Who would have dreamed that crap would end up like this? Of course they were 9 years old then, why would they be able to dream up this type of situation? But the past was past, and the many obstacles in their way were part of the past. They were in the now now, and the now was just too satisfying to forget now. Of course, Stan wasn't sure if he was feeling more physical or emotional satisfaction right now, since finally getting to kiss and touch most of Wendy's perfect body was pretty damm satisfying physically. But getting to do this with someone who had a perfect body with enough substance, smarts, and kindness to back it up wasn't so bad either.  
  
So Stan just looked into Wendy's deep eyes, put his arms back around her bare skin and kissed her, and figured he could worry about how lucky he was after Wendy was done putting her tounge back into his mouth. For now, although this makeout session probably wouldn't end with another round of....it, just being able to be this close to her seemed like the right way to wrap up the evening of a lifetime.  
  
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With all the love and sap that was just decribed, you would figure this would take place in a magical land of love and dreams- but South Park was not even close to being that good looking, even in the mid afternoon. Winter was just about over but the cold winds and dirty air were still everywhere, which Wendy had the "pleasure" of breathing as she walked down a street. She had just finished another day of school with another round of perfectly answered questions on her part, and after she put away her stuff at home, she was ready to go to finish her first after school duty of the day.  
  
Her thoughts inevitably went towards last night, as she figured they would. It was just one of those unplanned moments in which passion overruled common sense that moments like that should be saved for the actual date of the anniversary. And since Wendy had always been able to balance passion and logic well, it surprised her that logic so easily lost this round, but she would always be glad that it did. For 8 years she had the privledge of going out with the sweetest, most compassionate, and in her mind, hottest boy in the Midwest, if not the country. She was gonna see him naked sometime soon anyway, so why shouldn't she have just gotten it over with? Especially since he proved to be as, um, "talented" as she hoped he would be.....  
  
But a moment like that really didn't need to be ruined by thinking dirty like that, so she got her head out of the gutter quickly. Still, she had earned the right to think however she wanted. Her life so far had been most eventful, and would have been ruined by now had she not stopped herself from being nothing but a controlling, overbearing bitch over 8 years ago. It was taking that step and not trying to control things and people so much that really made her relationship possible. Without that personality change, her and Stan couldn't have survived that long even after he stopped his vomiting. They had both made efforts to fix the worst parts of their personality for each other, and it had paid off with 8 years of happy memories with at least a few decades more to follow. And with her smarts and determination and desire to change the things she saw as unfair, she figured she would find a career that would help them live out those decades on easy street soon enough.  
  
However, first things first. She was almost at Butters's house and she was about to help someone who wasn't on easy street when it came to math. So Wendy cleared her head again and decided to focus on the task at hand, then the thoughts about Stan and her luck could take over. With that, she headed down the last few hundred feet towards her friend's house.  
  
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When talking about the different types of love, few kids between 9-17 years old have a love for school and schoolwork, unless they're- as some thoughtless popular kids would say- Melvins. Butters Stotch was a Melvin in many ways, as he too loved schoolwork a lot of the time, but this sure as hell was not one of them. He had always found a way to do well in his subjects, but the kind of math he was faced with in his senior year of high school had been his match. If he didn't start to turn things around with tomorrow's test, he would inevitably slip even further than he had already- then when he graduated, who would take a C math student like him seriously?! At that point nothing would save him from being a bum or someone who has to eat crappy government food or something awful and scary like that!  
  
Butters willed himself to calm down, which he had gotten a little better at doing over the years. Though he had lost his childhood stutter, he was still a nervous person for as long as he could remember, and that's what caused him to overreact at times like this. He tried his best to think on the bright side, for if he could have survived years of being shunned by people and being labeled a nerd by other people even after the cool kids he knew had accepted him, he could overcome this. But he wasn't always the bravest kind of person, so that made it a lot easier to believe that he wouldn't. However, hope came back to him when he heard a knock on the door. That hope grew when he opened the door to see that Wendy had arrived.  
  
"Hi, Wendy!" Butters almost yelled that greeting in his usual chipper, overly happy tone of voice, but his brief worry about that disappeared since Wendy just smiled back at him. He knew how lucky he was to get her here to help him, since he knew she had more important things to do later tonight with Stan. He didn't want to take any chance of blowing his luck, but it looked like it was gonna stay around since Wendy went over to look at the math books Butters had on the living room table. "So this is the stuff that's giving you such a hard time?" Butters shook his head yes in reply. "Well, this doesn't look like something we can't handle, let's go up to your room and prove myself right!"  
  
Bitters figured that Wendy would be smart enough to back that up, even if she wasn't in his class and she didn't have this type of math. He wouldn't really be able to back that up though, because since high school began, he had never really been placed in many classes with his South Park friends and aquaintances. Butters shuddered at how much trouble that had been for him at first, but since this was hardly the time or place to remember unpleasent things like that, he shook his head and went up to his room with Wendy to handle the business at hand.  
  
For the next half hour Butters showed Wendy the kind of problems that had given him a lot of trouble and a lot of lost patience, problems that would likely be on the test. Once Wendy saw what Butters did wrong in those problems, she analyzed it and found out what he needed to do right. She explained the right procedures as best she could and told him to study them thoroughly to prepare for the test. If he remembered them then he should be able to solve the test problems by himself. Butters wasn't sure that he could, but he knew that now that he had something to go on, it would be a little easier for him. It was just a matter of memorizing and studying, and he was very good at those two things.  
  
Once they had covered most of the problems, Wendy looked at her watch and saw that it was close to 4:15. It was almost time to go, but of course she had to check and see if she had done something useful here first.  
  
"So now that we went over and corrected all your problems, do you think you can start memorizing the right way to do them?", Wendy said matter of factly. Since Butters looked less and less confused and overwhelmed by things as the half hour went on, she figured that he understood a little of what she was saying, and she was right. "I guess all I need is to study study study to remember all of this, that shouldn't take more than 3 hours or so!", Butters answered with a big smile that no one else would have with 3 hours of studying on the way. "I thought it was gonna take about 5 hours, but you knocked off a few for me and now I might sleep before midnight tonight! Thanks a bunch!"  
  
Wendy just smiled in response and figured she should start getting ready to go now, but Butters suddenly remembered something else he had to do during her visit here. "Oh, I almost forgot! Uh, look, I know you have more important things to do later on tonight, and I know this is kind of an important day for you. So I, um, got you and Stan a present. You can show it to him before your big date or whatever you have to go to." Butters went over to one of his drawers to find his gift, and Wendy looked on with intrige. Since Butters was one of the most thoughtful people she knew, he usually came up with a lot of good gifts for birthdays and special occasions, so she figured this one should be good too.  
  
"Ah, here it is!"  
  
Butters walked back to Wendy and handed her a framed photo...one that brought back a lot of memories for her. "Where did you...." Wendy couldn't even finish since the photo was so familar- in fact it looked like it was exactly 8 years old today.  
  
"Yeah, I was browsing around the Internet one day, then I found out someone was hiding in the bushes and taking pictures when you and Stan had your first kiss, and he was selling that picture on GGay! And since people have been tired of hearing about you and Stan, the bidding was cheap! So I only had to pay 60 bucks to get it, and my parents only had to loan me 30 bucks! I figured it's better you had this rather than someone who wasn't really interested in this kind of history. At least that was my way of thinking." Butters could tell that he had been on the right track as he saw Wendy admiring the photo of her and Stan's first puke free kiss 8 years ago. Eventually she was able to get back to normal to say something. "Gee.....thanks.", was all she could say, and since she was usually too smart to say something that simple, that made it clear that she was more than a little flattered. "You didn't have to go to this much trouble.", she went on to say in her normal fashion.  
  
"I know, but I, uh, figured I might as well, especially today. You didn't have to go to the trouble of helping me when you've got all this stuff with Stan later on. But you remembered me anyway and, eh, I figured you're supposed to do things like this for those type of friends, aren't you?"  
  
"Yeah, that does make a lot of sense." Wendy replied.  
  
"Heh, I was pretty lucky that someone had so much time on their hands to spy on you guys that night." Butters laughed in an attempt to turn the talk from sappy to funny. "Ha, it almost makes me wish that someone had the time to take a picture of my first kiss with Julia, yes it....does." Butters trailed off after mentioning that name, and Wendy knew why, which made her feel a little guilty about talking so much about her and Stan earlier.   
  
For Butters, he didn't have the kind of luck that Stan did to keep a girl for 8 years- he would have if Julia hadn't moved away 5 years ago because her dad's motivational speeches at the South Park Hell's Pass Hospital had gotten him national attention. Bill Simmons had been going on tours all over the country ever since, and Julia had rarely been able to visit her boyfriend or have time to call him. Now they rarely were able to talk at all in any form and it was starting to make Butters think they really wouldn't get back together full time soon, like he thought they would. He always tried to be optimistic about things, but several harsh lessons over the last decade had taught him that the world did not always give out happy endings for kids like him. Still, he had maintained his pleasent and helpful personality throughout it all- but that sure didn't help get his girlfriend back, did it? As Butters's body language got more noticably sadder, Wendy went over to give him some support.  
  
"Don't think whatever bad thoughts you're thinking of. It's not your fault she isn't visiting or calling, and it probably isn't even her fault, I'm sure she still misses you. She knows that she's a lucky girl to have been together with you, and if she forgot it....well, there must be a lot of unshallow girls who would be equally lucky to go out with you! Just because people like me and Stan may have had more luck than you in love, that doesn't mean you can't catch up. I really do believe that." Butters turned his head to see Wendy wearning a reassuring smile, which combined with the speech, helped to up his spirits a little- it seemed to be one of her talents. So he got himself to smile and that did the trick to end that little bit of tension.   
  
"There you go, Butters. Now I guess I really should be going, and I'll be sure that Stan sees this too. I'll try to talk him outta suing GGay, but I'm not promising anything." Wendy got her things together for real this time and was about to walk out of the room. "Now you do your studying and get that grade up so I'll have two things to be proud of about tonight, okay?" Butters kept his smile on as he sat down at the little desk in his room to start his work, so Wendy figured she should leave him alone to keep his unspoken promise. She gave him a light pat on the back and headed out of the room right after that.  
  
Butters turned his head just in time to see her disappear out of sight. He breathed in a bit and was a bit surprised that his nose caught a sweet smell- it seemed that the smell of Wendy's hair had lingered a bit. She probably got ready for her date a little early. Stan would be quite lucky to see her after she got finished dressing up, Butters imagined, since she looks nice enough and her hair looks and smells great enough even without any special.....Butters quickly slapped his foreheard to snap himself out of this. It really was confusing to him that he would think that way about her just by thinking of her hair like that. But he had drove those thoughts out of his head the other few times that had happened over the years, so he did it again. The best way to think of her was to take advantage of the tips she had given him and study his ass off without any distractions. So Butters relaxed a bit and got ready for his long night of memorizing things, figuring he'd leave the thinking of dates and romance to Wendy and Stan for now.  
  
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As Butters began his marathon of studying, Wendy started walking away from the house to head home, figuring she'd get back home in about 15-20 minutes or so. To keep herself busy during that time, she thought about how her tutoring session would likely be a big help for Butters. It was good that she fit him in during her busy night tonight, for now she felt a little extra good after aiding him and after getting that neat picture from him. But if anyone other than Stan was thoughtful enough to find that obscure picture, it would have been Butters, Wendy imagined. It was extra good to know that after all the hard things and ordeals he had been through in his life, Butters was still able to keep from being a bitter son of a bitch and stay the same sweet person he was when he was 9 years old.   
  
Pride swelled up in Wendy even more as she kept walking, as now that this business was done, she was off to have her fun with the other kid in South Park that had stayed as sweet and wonderful as he was when he was 9. It was gonna be one hell of a night after the hell of the night they had last night....  
  
But before Wendy went back to relieving that night, she was interrupted by some chirping. She turned and saw that a little squirrel had gone into the road next to her. Since she was still the same concerned environmentalist she was when she was 9, she hardly wanted the squirrel to get hit by an oncoming car, especially since she just passed a big pothole on the road a few houses down. After making sure no cars were coming, she went on the road and shooed the squirrel away, making some noises that she thought might be squirrel like to do so. They worked after about 5 seconds and the squirrel went away. Wendy then decided to head back to the street.  
  
Then she heard another noise. The sound of a car hitting that big pothole she had passed by. About a second later she saw that car coming and spinning out of control thanks to the bump it had hit. Wendy quickly went back on the street to avoid it, but the car didn't look like it was gonna be on the road much longer. It was driving sideways towards the street despite the driver's best efforts, and Wendy backed away some more until she found herself up against a mailbox.  
  
Wendy only looked at that mailbox for a split second. But that was too long because once she turned her head, she had no time to react as the car was headed right for a collision with the mailbox- with her right in the middle.  
  
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Butters was trying to tune out the noises from outside, so the sound of a crash about 5 houses away from his didn't get through to him. But once he heard several people making shocked noises after that crash, he got a little annoyed and went to close his window. But before he did, he actually caught a look at the people outside and saw that they were running towards something. He stuck his head out a little longer to get a better look, and finally he got to see the sight of a wrecked car that had crashed into a wrecked mailbox....with a girl trapped between the two wrecked objects and not moving at all.  
  
For one brief moment, a chill ran through Butters's spine as she thought the girl looked almost familar. But he tried to shake it off, telling himself that she had already left and was on her way to Stan's. Yet his curiosity and desire to reassure his paranoia got the best of him, so he found some binoculars and used them to get a better look at the victim. And once he could get that better look and realize who it really was, the chill returned with a horrible, horrible vengance. And it didn't take long for total panic and fear to take it's place.  
  
With that, Butters ran out of his room and out of his house like a man totally possessed to get to the crash site.  
  
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The next 45 minutes after that were almost a blur to Butters. All he could remember was that he had ran to the crash site to see the unconsicous Wendy, yelled at a few people to call an ambulance even though they already had, and then he brought himself to go back to his house to call Stan. He was already shocked enough by the accident itself that he had no idea how he was gonna tell Stan about it, but he had to so he could be there, just in case it was really serious. But when he got a hold of Stan, all he was able to say was that Wendy was in a car accident nearby his house before he heard Stan hang up a split second later.  
  
By the time Stan got there and by the time the rest of Wendy's friends found out about it, she was already about to be moved to Hell Pass Hospital. Stan rode with her in the amblance along with another late "guest", Wendy's mother Ann Testaburger. Butters got his parents to drive him to the hospital to see what was going on, and by the time they got there, Stan, his best friend Kyle, Wendy's best friend Bebe, Ms Testaburger, and a few other classmates had already gotten to the hospital waiting room. A doctor told them to stay there for any further word before he went to check up on Wendy and see what could be done for her.  
  
For about 20 minutes, this group of people sat and waited in total silence. Stan and Ms Testaburger moved closer to the entrance of the room, figuring they'd get the news faster that way. They were trying to keep their hopes up by reassuring each other that Wendy would be just fine, but since they had seen how Wendy looked up close before she went into surgery, their confidence was a little shaken. The rest of the gang just sat there, lost in their own thoughts about what was going on and trying not to say the worst, for Stan and Ms Testaburger's sake. So Butters kept his extreme worries to himself.  
  
What if the worst had happened? What if the doctors couldn't fix her? What if Butters turned out to be the last person to ever see her healthy? This time it was a lot harder to get these paranoid thoughts out of Butters's brain. But the way he tried to reassure himself was that this couldn't happen to Wendy. The world was cruel to Melvins and nerds like him, it doesn't do these kind of tricks on cool people like Wendy. It just couldn't. Butters had considered Wendy as one of his best friends, she was always there for him if he came to her with a problem, and if she doesn't have to stay alive so she doesn't leave him, she has to stay alive so she doesn't leave Stan. She can't leave Stan like this at all. She wouldn't do that without a fight, cause she survived a prison term and tons of puking to be with Stan, so a little car accident wouldn't take her away now, right? Butters swore to himself that he had to believe he was right, or else he'd just go nuts and that would sure help the mood right there. So he sat in silence with the rest.  
  
5 minutes later the same doctor came over, but he tiptoed towards the group and made sure that Stan and Ms Testaburger, who were lost in their own thoughts, didn't see him. Once he made sure they didn't, he signaled the others to come with him to a nearby room, and they did.  
  
"So what's the word and why did you have to put us in here to tell us?", asked Bebe, who wanted to ignore the implications in a move like this and believe he wanted to say that Wendy was okay in private. But the way the doctor sighed at that point filled her with less hope.  
  
"I'm afraid that by the time we got her here, the impact of the car and the mailbox crushed her stomach, broke too many bones, and caused too much internal bleeding. We tried to slow it down but there was no way we could do it without causing any more damage."  
  
"So what are you saying? That she'll be dead soon and we don't have much time to say goodbye?", Kyle asked on behalf of the group.  
  
"No....I'm saying that it's already too late for any goodbyes. She officially died about 3 minutes ago. I brought you away from Mr Marsh and Ms Testaburger to say this because, well, I wanted to warm up by telling you first before I told them and ruined their lives! They're gonna be hysterical after they find out and I'm a bit afraid to be the one to tell them and get them started, so do you think one of you could break it to them easier?" The doctor looked for someone that he might pass the buck too, but the shock and growing sadness over everyone's face told him that he would have no such luck. "Well fine then, I'll tell them and I'll listen to them blaming us for this tragedy, I hope that gives you some comfort at least." Luckly he left before anyone could realize how insensitive that was.  
  
Everyone was now lost in the aftermath of what had happened. Wendy Testaburger was dead. Bebe's best friend was gone forever. Kyle's best friend's girlfriend was gone for good and he would have a lot of work to do to help Stan through it. The other kids were sad because a friend and a tutor that could have helped them pass their hardest courses was dead. But it took the longest for any thoughts at all to run through Butters's head. All he could do was hear the words "She officially died about 3 minutes ago" in his head. He didn't look like he was on the brink of crying like Bebe was, but it was still clear that until Stan and Ms Testaburger got the news, the death was hitting him worst of all.  
  
But that was before they heard the screams. First a scream was heard that obviously came from a woman, and was full of a mothers desperation over her world crumbling. This was Ms Testaburger reacting to being left all alone. And then another scream came from someone else. It was a scream that was almost inhuman, an ugly, tortured sound that no human should be sad enough to yell. It was the sound of a young man who seemed to have lost everything that mattered to him, and in many ways, Stan had.  
  
And once Stan's scream over his beloved's death was finished, among the group in the next room, Butters's tears were the first to fall. 


	2. Act 1, Scene 2: Fonder Memories

It took about 5 days to clean Wendy's body up and to make preperations for the funeral. Because of Wendy's fame as a child, the ceremony would naturally attract some media attention, but Ms Testaburger made the church promise to keep as many reporters out of the ceremony as possible. A wake would be held at the church, and after the eulogy and other such things, the casket holding Wendy would be closed and taken to the cemetary for a burial. Practically everyone in town planned to come to the church for the viewing.  
  
Stan and Ms Testaburger were inconsolable, especially since no one knew how to console them. Their closest friends knew that because they were so close to the deceased, the slightest wrong thing said could push them to the brink of despair or make them tear a few heads off in anger. Not even Kyle or Stan's parents knew how to try and get Stan to feel a little better, they just knew that it probably couldn't be done. So many of the people just left him alone to sort out his grief on his own. That was no problem for Butters since he didn't want to be anywhere near Stan for fear that he might let out his anger on him for having Wendy come over to begin with. He was a better person to blame than the driver, who wasn't even drunk and all he did was hit a huge pothole and spin out of control, plus he was already dead too. Butters had to live with his now larger share of the blame enough without Stan reminding him.  
  
As for the eulogy, it was more harder to pick who would do it than most thought. Obviously Stan or Wendy's mother were the best people to talk about Wendy, but since they were so shaken up by this, there wasn't a good chance that they would get through the eulogy without breaking down in tears. They both knew that as well, so they tried to select a replacement, and somehow they settled on selecting Butters. He was broken down by this, but there was a better chance that he could get through a whole speech than Stan and Ms Testaburger could. So although Butters had only 3 days at the time to think of a good speech, he brought himself to go through with it.  
  
On the day of the funeral, after Father Maxi did his sermonizing and reporters had their chance to take pictures before Ms Testaburger literally threw them outside, Butters got his chance to speak. After he was introduced by Father Maxi, it took a lot of effort for him to get up and face the huge crowd of mourners that were looking to him to deliver one final poignent memory of Wendy. After taking a few deep breaths, he went up to the pulpit, pulled out his speech, and began.  
  
"G-Good afternoon." Butters cleared his throat and willed himself to not let his old stutter return, then he went back to reading from the paper. "We're all here to say a final goodbye to a very important person. At first she made a huge impact on a few people, then she just disappeared outta sight for a while, but then when she came back to the spotlight she did it with a vengenace and she didn't let go for 8 years. Many of us are very lucky that she touched our lives in a way before....she let go." Deciding that he wouldn't get tempted to cry this early, Butters took a pause and carried on when he was all set again.  
  
"How can someone in my position best describe Wendy Testaburger? How can I sum up the kind of person that she was, the kind of person who was hated to the bitter end by some, loved to the bitter end by others, and who survived the onslaught by others along the way? When I was putting together this speech, I visited her room to see if there was something there that could help me out. And there was. She had one special item in her room that reminded me of a story, one that really describes how lucky we were to know a woman like her. Some of you already know this story, but I've never told it to a lot of you. But it's a story I never would have lived to tell if not for Wendy Testaburger."  
  
"It all started when me and my fellow kids started high school...."  
  
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4 years ago, Butters had narrowly survived middle school and lived to tell that tale. Although he still had the kids of South Park as his friends, he met a lot of new kids that weren't so tolerant of his desire to learn and his belief of being nice to everybody, since that pretty much labels you as a nerdy fag by the most ignorant kid. There were plently of ignorant kids in middle school, and when Butters's regular friends weren't around they liked to give Butters a hard time. Occasionally it stopped when he managed to tell teachers and authority figures about the bullying, but then it just came back even more so after that. Unfortunatly, it was in Butters's senior year that Julia had to leave town, so without her around to fight back for him, the taunting and teasing got worse and worse until the year mercifully ended. After spending the summer licking his wounds, Butters brought himself to look forward to high school, even though it was logical that the older kids there would be even crueler and stereotypical. But he figured if he was around Stan, Kyle, and the gang in a lot of his classes, it wouldn't be so bad.  
  
However, when he was placed in his classes and it turned out that absolutly no one else he knew was in any of his classes, and he would be surrounded by new people all day with no one from his group of peers to notice what would happen to him, it got pretty bad pretty fast.  
  
Over the first three months of the school year, the lesser minded assholes of the school targeted Butters for answering most of the questions in their classes, for looking like a nerd, for sounding like a nerd, for refusing to do their homework for them, or all of the above and more. First they just shoved him around into lockers and such, then they started hitting him in the stomach when they didn't think they were getting through to him, and finally at that point they began hitting him in the face when they were really pissed off. Soon they just started picking on him to laugh as he pleaded for mercy, since they were raised on the premise that pleas for mercy and showing any emotion were funny things that only pussies do.   
  
By the time Thanksgiving was over, this pussy was nearing the end of his rope. He wasn't able to get to his South Park friends in school, and they were too busy with their own busy schedule and adventures to listen to him. He had told his parents about his troubles at first, but after they tried to get the powers that be to make the bullies stop, it was no coincedence that Butters got fewer moments of peace after that. So trying that little move again was definatly out. Therefore, this was his schedule. Whenever the teacher's back was turned, some people liked to throw papers at him or flick him on the ear or do something to distract him from work. When he was at lunch, he was lucky to eat everything that was given to him more than 2 days a week. When it was between classes and someone either wanted homework answers or a good laugh, Butters would come out of it either shaken up or hurt a little bit. If it kept up any longer he was going to get used to this pattern and start forgetting what it was like to have a peaceful school day. Not that he had many peaceful school days in his life already, but at least before he could get some work done and find something fun to pass the time, unlike here.  
  
So when he went to lunch one day in the middle of December, he had just come off an ordeal where a guy one foot taller than him had stolen his notebook full of history notes, and given him a black eye for a souviner. Butters figured he could at least get a milk from the lunch line to calm the swelling, so he just took the various types of "food" in front of him and headed for the milk. That is, until he heard a familar female voice call out, "Butters?" And he only had to look up to see Wendy on the other side of the counter.  
  
"Wendy?! What are you doing here, you don't have lunch in 5'th period like I do! No one does!" Butters didn't mean to nitpick that much, but he was just too happy to see someone he knew at lunch for a change that he had to make sure it was for real. Wendy didn't mind so much as she answered, "The Mentally Gifted Program had me serve lunch for the week as a kind of gift to the less intellegent. But what the hell kind of "gift" do you have on your face?" Knowing she meant his shiner, Butters tried to think of an alternate answer from the truth, just in case his squealing to her made it's way back to the bullies and they got pissed.  
  
"Um, I, I j-just fell down the steps and I l-landed right on my eye, that's all." Since he had reverted to his stutter, Wendy hardly believed him, so she told him to move ahead before he held up the line some more. Then when he paid for his lunch she went right over to him before he sat down at a table all by himself like usual. "This explains it, doesn't it? I've seen you stumble home and look shaken up in the halls more than a few times, and this is why. Someone's doing something to you while we're all off having fun, right?"  
  
"I don't k-know w-what you're t-talking about."  
  
"You're stuttering more than ever, if I wasn't on to something then you'd sound normal. Are you nervous because Cartman's doing something to you, or are Stan and Kyle playing tricks on you again, or what?! If you're protecting people I know because they're doing shit to you like in 4'th grade, then-"  
  
"It's not them, it's practically everyone else in this whole Goddamm, Godforsaken school, are you happy now?!" Though everyone was shocked at first, Butters was the most shocked of all after he finally reached his boiling point. But for most of the people in the cafeteria, their shock quickly turned to laughter because, let's face it, when a nerd yells and screams about being fed up, it sounds hilarious to pretty much everyone. They all laughed at that high pitched screaming and ignored the valid point he was trying to make. Everyone except Wendy, who actually seemed pissed at the people laughing at him. So ignoring her regular duties, she led Butters to a lunch table after the laughter was finished, and calmed him down by asking, "You wanna explain that to someone who actually cares enough to listen to you?"  
  
So Butters took up about half of the lunch period explaining his ordeals over the last 3 1/2 months. He also took his time explaining how useless it would be to tell a teacher, the principal, or their friends about what was happening. That practically eliminated Wendy's original options to solve the problem, so she had to work her brain a little harder. "And all of these people are bigger than you and have more muscles than you?"  
  
"Well, if they were wimps, I wouldn't have this big of a shiner, would I?" Wendy excused Butters's sharp comment due to his hard times, but Butters quickly made up for it himself. "Geez, I'm sorry. It's just that this has been such a hard time for me. I can't focus on my schoolwork, I have no one to talk to all day, and although their ways of torturing aren't as painful as the ones in 4'th grade, they're pretty close! I just need to be beat up by adults and the illusion is complete, hooray for me!" He slammed his fist on the table since he didn't have any other ideas to show off his anger. "I really thought this kind of crap was gonna stop happening to me this time."  
  
"Maybe it doesn't have to stay that way. You just told me a lot of damming stuff about some very important people. I'm starting to get some power and respect around here, so it's very good that I know this. Tell you what, from now on if someone hurts you or pulls a prank on you, you tell me all about it, and I'll find some way to get the culprit back. If I can find effective ways to fight back against your attackers, they should back off by the end of the year."  
  
A slightly puzzled Butters could only answer, "Why would you go to all that trouble for me? Don't you have a lot better things to do like everyone else?"  
  
"Butters, you and I are friends, right?" The boy shook his head yes as an answer. "And if it was me who was hurt and disturbed for no real reason at all, wouldn't you try and help me? Even if you were scared or you had other things to do?"  
  
"I, um, I probably would be a little scared but that's just me. But if you were being mistreated like that, then sure I'd wanna do something!"  
  
"Exactly. You're a friend of mine, and you're being put through hell that you don't deserve and is completly unfair. And after the shit you've been through in your last two schools, it really should have been different this time!" Wendy stopped herself before she got a little too passionate about the issue, but she went on in a calmer matter anyway. "You just try to get through this and I'll think of a way to make it a little easier for you, that's the real important thing here." With that, Wendy went off to get her own food so she could come back and finish the period with Butters. The boy didn't know whether to be worried for her or just stay grateful that someone was finally noticing him, but in any case, he finally had someone to talk to during lunch. For that he should put aside his fears for at least 10 minutes.  
  
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After the final bell rung and Wendy packed up her lockers to leave for the day, she headed for the staircase to go down to the first floor. But before that, she saw that a closet door nearby was slightly open, so she figured she should close it just in case some janitor needed it closed. However, once she saw the people inside the closet, she kept the door slightly open. Inside, there were a group of students hovering around Butters, who was lying on the floor in fear. She hid back to see what the heck they were saying and doing to him, and she gathered that they were teasing him for actually sitting with her in lunch. They were trying to get his goat by saying Wendy had caught nerd germs by being around him, and when he tried to object, he got hit. And the fact that he was almost crying from this punch made them laugh more and more. "Aw, look at the little baby crying from getting a boo-boo. What a faggy little pussy buttpirate, huh fellas?" This taunt from the largest member of the group made the assholes laugh more and more and have more fun in calling Butters a fag pussy for crying.  
  
As they did this, none of them saw Wendy watching them, nor could they sense that her blood was practically boiling the more she saw this spectacle. She had already killed someone before, but that was when she hired Iraqis to do the job. Now she almost felt like she could kill these people with her bare hands this time- but she thought of a better idea instead. She went inside the closet just as the Butters torturing group finished their next round of lauging at the scared Butters.   
  
"Hey guys, having fun?" The group turned to finally see that Wendy was there. The largest boy then figured it was time to turn on the charm, since one of the hottest girls in school was nearby and she might wanna have fun "playing" with a real man instead of that pussy Stan. "Just playing around with nerds, babe. I don't wanna brag, but I do the best job of pushing people around. And away from people who I like, if you get my meaning." Since Wendy was smart enough to know the meaning, it took more of her self control to avoid strangling him right there. But she stuck to her plan and leaned right up close to the bully, putting her hand on his chest. "You sure are a real man, aren't you? I'll bet you don't get hurt by anything.", she went on as her hand went lower and lower down the boy's chest. "I'm not even sure you'd be hurt by something like this!"  
  
And with that, she made her move as she put his hand on the front of his pants, and squeezd his covered testicles with almost superhuman strength. She just kept squeezing and crushing the balls with her hand as the others were too stunned to do anything, and her victim obviously was in too much pain to fight back. Finally one of his friends pleaded, "Come on, stop doing that, man!" But all Wendy said was, "Not until I see some tears." And once she squeezed hard enough so that the bully was showing a few tears from so much pain, she finally pushed him against the wall and let go, leaving him in the fetal position to try and heal. Wendy then turned her attention to the nearly crippled kid's friends.  
  
"If I EVER see or hear about any of you hurting Butters again....well, when I get done with you, you'll only wish you were in as much pain as this guy is in right now." And since that meant they would be in enough pain to nearly kill them, the group took this threat rather seriously and ran off to feel relieved that their balls weren't the ones that were bruised. With the threat very clearly made, Wendy helped Butters up and left the closet to take him home, leaving the bully there to try his best not to throw up.  
  
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"From that day on, a lot of those kids really got the message that if I got picked on, someone would fight back for me. A few of them didn't pay attention since they weren't afraid of what they called, wussy girls. But after they heard about Wendy's ball crushing abilities, they began to back off a little. And as many of you know, she talked the guys into paying more attention to me and finding time to include me in their activities and stuff. And by the time the year was over, she helped make sure I was picked on less even though we didn't share any classes together! I got more of my work done and I got my grades up with little trouble!" The present day Butters cleared his throat before he got to the most important part of the story.  
  
"So by the time the school year ended, the anniversary of the South Park riots was coming up. I knew some people might say that Wendy didn't deserve to still be free from prison, and they'd say it in the editoral section of the newspaper. Well, since I knew that those kind of comments weren't fair, and they would too if they spent more than 10 minutes with her.....I decided to send something to the paper as a thank you present."  
  
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It was the middle of May, and the freshman year of high school of the South Park kids was nearly over. Also, on this particular day, it was exactly 5 years ago that the final battle between Stan Marsh and Francis Widmark took place over Wendy's imprisonment for Ellen Widmark's murder. Many people still thought it was wrong for her to get out of her prison sentence after those riots and after Widmark's suicide. A few weeks earlier, Butters decided that those comments wouldn't be the only ones in the editorial section of the paper that day. So he wrote a speech and requested that it be put in the paper on the anniversary date- and Butters was overjoyed to see that it had that morning. With that, he bought the paper before he went to school, and before he had to go to his first class, he found Wendy in the hallways with Bebe and walked over to them.  
  
"Wendy? I, uh, since I'm not getting tortured or beaten anymore because of you, and since today's such a big day....I figured you should have this." She handed Wendy the paper that he bought, and naturally the two girls were confused about this kind of present. "Open to the editorial page and you'll find it there." Wendy turned her attention to the paper and found a substantial editorial that went something like this.  
  
5 years ago South Park almost got destroyed over the war to free Wendy Testaburger. 5 years ago a police chief killed himself rather than face jail time for murdering people to keep her locked up. 5 years ago her friends finished the job of talking the governer into letting her go. But even to this day people still believe that was the worst possible thing to do. All they think about is how Wendy hired enemies of our country to murder an innocent lesbian because she thought she wanted sex with her boyfriend, though of course she didn't. But that's all they want to see. They either don't see or don't wanna see the girl who's the smartest person I know[sorry Kyle]They don't see that she's done so much to make up for her mistakes, and though she knows she can never really make up for those mistakes, it doesn't stop her from being good enough to make sure the sacrifices of that mob weren't for nothing. And here's something they really wouldn't bother to see. She could spend all her time being smart and ignoring less intellegent people and only thinking of her troubles and Stan's. But instead she takes the time to think of others before herself, and she's just as likely to do an overboard gesture for someone like me as she would for people more important to her.  
  
I wouldn't be well enough to write this message if it wasn't for Wendy Testaburger. I can't change some people's minds about her but I can stay plently mad at you anyway. Because if you knew her like me and everyone else did, you'd be glad we almost destroyed the town to help get her back. I for one am very lucky and very proud to call her my friend, and lots of other people are too. I just wanted to remind the people of South Park that some of us are glad she's on the outside today.  
  
Thank you, Wendy, and thanks to the paper for holding this speech until today like I asked.  
  
Sincerely,  
  
Butters Stotch.  
  
Before an overcome Wendy could bring herself to look up and thank Butters, the bell had already rung and he was already in his first class, and barely on time too.  
  
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The present day Butters then pulled out that very same newspaper editorial from 4 years ago to show to everyone. "A few days ago when I was in Wendy's room, looking for some ideas for the eulogy, I found this on her desk. She cut out my article and kept it in her room all these years. Maybe it was to satisfy her ego, I don't know. But I like to think she did that because she knew how hard I worked on it and how much....how much I wanted to show my appreciation for everything she did for me that year, and how much I appreciated her friendship period. That article, and what she did to make me write it, well, it really sums up everything you need to remember about her. It's those type of things she did for me and everyone here that explain why we worked so hard to get her sentence overturned, and why we're all here to show how much we miss her. At least that's what I think."  
  
Butters was on the verge of tears already, but he knew he'd go overboard if he saw the sad reaction and tears of the mourners a second longer. So since he had made his points, he went down from the pulpit and considered his speech finished. But before he went to sit down, he wanted to see Wendy's open casket.  
  
Unlike the last time he saw her, when she was unconsious and bloody from a car accident, this time she looked serene and peaceful. It almost made him cry and made him feel relieved that this would be Butters last image of her. Of course since it was the last time he would see her face up close, that gave the sad part the upper hand. Overcome from this, he leaned down and gave her a brief kiss on her already pale forehead, then he muttered "Goodbye" and went to his seat before he saw any of his fellow mourners faces again. And for the longest time, he didn't get why he actually kissed that dead body, since that was gonna be Stan's job later on.  
  
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A few hours later at the local cemetary, the casket was closed and put into Wendy's grave, and at this point they were already putting dirt on it. The mourners were out getting their last looks at the casket, or walking around to find something else to do with their time. Butters was just standing around until he saw Ms Testaburger coming towards him, then he didn't know what to do. But he decided to stay as the ex-mother struggled to find whatever she wanted to say to him.  
  
"I, I never knew that was the real reason why you wrote that speech. Better late than never, I guess." Ann Testaburger now looked like she was losing her fight to hold back her tears, and finally she let them go while her head was on Butters's shoulder. Now he had no choice but to embrace her and let her put tear stains on his blue tux. When she finished, all she could say was "Thank you. Thank you for giving me one last good memory of her. Now I'm all alone." Since she was all alone now, Butters didn't really have anything to say to reassure her, so he let her go off to wipe her tears and morn with someone else. Once she left, Kyle came over to him.  
  
"That was a cool speech, Butters. I almost forgot how much Wendy bugged us to let you in our games that year, but you reminded me." Kyle paused to catch himself from getting emotional. "You never really appreciate how much someone can bug you or how someone was actually smarter than you until they're gone, huh? She was really the only smart person other than me and Stan in this damm town, and I should have taken advantage of that more often."  
  
"Sure Kyle, whatever you say." was all Butters could say. He looked around for a bit until he found Stan standing right at Wendy's grave, watching the dirt being put on the casket. Butters then started to panic. "Kyle, you'd better go before Stan looks for you and he finds me!"  
  
"You don't want him to talk to you about the eulogy? Or about how you obviously kissed her before you sat down?" Kyle did really know why Butters didn't wanna be near Stan, but he figured he might be able to get Butters to stop thinking about it with those accusations. They didn't work. "If Stan sees me, he's gonna yell at me and tell me it's all my fault she's dead! If she hadn't gone to my house to help me study, she wouldn't have been near that car and she wouldn't have died! I know that enough without him taking out his rage on me!"  
  
"I know Butters, I know. But if we did try to talk to him before he said that.....what would we say?" Both Kyle and Butters shut up and looked at Stan. They saw that no one else was near him because, like them, they didn't know how to talk to him. He had lost the one and only love of his life[if you discount Miss Ellen since that was just a stupid crush that led to many deaths], so how could anyone talk to him and say everything was gonna be okay? How could they face him without driving him to even more pain and suffering? Like Kyle said, what could they say?  
  
And now that Wendy was officially laid to rest....what was he going to do with the rest of his life now? 


	3. Act 1, Scene 3: I Don't Want You to Die ...

Author's note: This scene is very different from the others because it takes place in Stan's point of view, so this is a first person formatted chapter entirely through his eyes and thoughts, in case the format and trying to figure out who's talking confuses you.  
  
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I'm tired but I can't sleep. I'm hungry but I don't wanna eat. I wanna put on something to watch or listen to, but I don't feel like getting up. I wanna get out of my room but I don't have the energy to do it. This isn't how I was supposed to spend a day like this. I should be talking to her on the phone or getting ready to go to her house or inviting her to watch me kick Cartman's ass at some game. I shouldn't be reminding myself that I can't ever see her again period.  
  
Was it all for nothing? 8 years ago I worked my ass off to stop being nervous around her, and I almost died from a fucking maturity drug that made me get older for my trouble. I thought that since I got through so much to even kiss her, it couldn't end this way. I thought that when I took a bullet to save her life from Widmark in jail, it couldn't end this way. The last 8 years of my life have largely been spent building on my relationship and love for this one girl. All my efforts were supposed to help us live the rest of our lives together. But now that that can never be....was it for nothing? Did I just waste half of my life on a dream that God didn't plan to come true for me?  
  
Ah, God. I somehow still remember seeing Him in Vegas at the millenium. He played a cruel trick on me when he said I can't have a period, and now He does this as a sequel. He knows how hard I worked to be with her, yet He took her anyway. He basically told me that it didn't matter what I did for her and what she did for me, it was all for nothing, cause if it wasn't, we'd still be looking forward to graduating high school together. But we aren't, are we?! ARE WE?!!  
  
Well, I just knocked my lamp over, I guess that should get someone's attention.....no, no one's coming. Not even my parents have been able to talk to me about this. No one has. They all see that I'm in pain and I'm in trouble, so why isn't anyone coming over to help me? Don't they see I can't try and move on without some guidance from someone? I'll even take Cartman coming over to say something, cause at least once he says that I should be happy the "bitch" is gone, I can regain the energy to kill him. That'll get me riled up and out of bed. But no, I don't hear anyone heading for my room. I don't hear anyone saying "You gotta get outta here and move on, you gotta live life." But what good is life when the only girl I've ever loved is gone?  
  
I don't know how I remembered it, but that's exactly what I said in that dumbass National Trash article 8 years ago- or what they claimed I said. Somehow I can relate more to that story now. They said that she broke up with me and I grieved so much about it that I became a goth, then when Butters helped me recover I flipped her off and went on with my life, glad that no bitchy girl could take my man time away from me now. That was a complete work of fucking fiction of course. But now that I'm in that position where I lost her for good, I wonder if it wasn't so much a made up article that the editor claimed to be more "realistic" than our real love adventures, or a prophecy. Am I going to be this sad over her loss forever that I'll seem like a pathetic joke that's no better than a goth? Will I be willing to throw the rest of my life away just because I don't have a girlfriend anymore and no girl can take my man time away? I don't think I'm that pathetic. But then what's left?  
  
Without her, the biggest part of my life, how can I possibly rearrange my future without her?  
  
And why the fuck can't I even say or think about her fucking name?!!  
  
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It's the same thing every day now. Since I don't have to go back to school yet, I can just wake up, get some breakfast from Mom, watch TV without really watching what's going on, ignore the uncomfortable silence between me and my parents, sit outside to myself for a while, walk around town, hear some comments from people about how sorry they are about what happened, go back home, eat dinner, then go right to sleep. I think I get how I'm supposed to "move on" now.  
  
Now for the part where I walk around town trying to get some fresh air, but really not getting my mind off of anything. So here I am walking down some street and trying not to remember the things we did in many of the places I'm passing by. Maybe when I pass by the local resteraunt, I won't remember that we had our last date there and we were supposed to have one that night. Nope, that didn't work. Oh look, here comes Kyle all of a sudden. Wonder why he wants to talk to me now?  
  
"Hey Stan, we're all going to throw large snowballs with rocks in them at cars, wanna join us?" Oh I see, get me to cheer up by playing a game we outgrew when we were 11, great plan. But it looks like he's still going. "Come on Stan, we can make it a game to see how many windows we can break, you don't want Cartman to be the champ in that game, do you?" Oh, he knows what the hell I want, and he's doing a piss poor job of pretending like it never happened, and I can just go back to the way things were without thinking about what things should be like, the pretensious bastard!  
  
Okay, maybe it wasn't fair to think that way about my other best friend, the one who's still alive, so I'd better go before I actually say that out loud. But there he goes following me. "Stan, if you don't wanna play that game, is there something else you wanna play that we can do together?" There's nothing that can get my mind off anything for more than 5 minutes, so what the hell would be the point? Wonder if he bothered to think of that.   
  
"Look Stan, we all miss her and I do too, okay?! But do you think she would want you to keep being like this? Do you think she would want you to keep feeling miserable instead of living life the way you were planning to before? No, I don't think she would! The best way you can honor her is to live your life and prove that everything she did to help you be a better person wasn't for nothing!" Okay, I think it's time to turn around and bring some reality to this conversation.  
  
"If it was for nothing, why isn't she here?! She was supposed to help me through all my problems forever, or else why would she have set me up like this? You're telling me I should accept that she did everything she did for me just to have it end like that, unfinished and alone?!"  
  
"Well what choice do you have now?! I'm sorry, but that's what I finally figured out I had to say to you! No one's been talking to you because we didn't know how to get you to move on, how could we know after how we saw you react to her death?! But it's clear you need some tough love sooner rather than later before you get even worse!"  
  
"Love?" Now that was a huge laugh and a dumb fucking thing to say, and I was gonna tell him why. "Don't you fucking tell me about love! Who are you to be an expert on love when you never even loved someone to lose like this!! I'm the only fucking expert on love in this fucking town! But there's no way I can get it back!"  
  
"We all know it'll take you years to forget about her, but-" Oh, that did it.  
  
"Forget?! Have you been fucking listening to me, Kyle?!! I can't forget!! This whole Goddamm town won't let me forget, and it's not just because of the get well wishes! Every single thing in this town reminds me of her! I can look at anything here and remember the time me and her went there to do stuff! I can remember every place we ever made out! I can remember all our milestones and every place we had them in! I can never go to Stark's Pond again and that was one of my favorite places to relax, and now it's filled with fucking memories of what I had and why I can't stand it that I lost it all! Don't you get it, man?!"  
  
"Then, then maybe you should go on vacation for a while and come back when you don't remember all that."  
  
"When I don't remember it? Those memories make up most of my fucking life!! How can I not remember most of my whole fucking life, Kyle?!! You're the smartest person in town now, you gotta have an answer for that, don't you?!" I'm not even gonna give him a chance to answer, since the more he talks, the more he's reminding me of stuff instead of making me feel better, so I'm just gonna walk away. "Stan? Stan, you can't leave!!"  
  
"I'm not the one who left and gave me enough memories so I could never be able to forget her and all this fucking pain! You remember that the next time you try this shit!" Of course, now I wish there won't be a next time cause this time was bad enough. There goes my chance to have a relatively peaceful walk now.  
  
======================================================  
  
That fucking Kyle. Why did he have to make me say that everything reminds me of her?! Now I remember that everything does remind me of her! There's the spot where we made out to see how long we could make out without taking a breath. And there's where I saved her from tripping on a rock and breaking her leg when we were 14. We hid behind that building over there when we wanted to get away from 6'th graders. And that's.....that's the drug store where I bought condoms for that one last special night.....oh God, they're still in my coat pocket! I can't carry these around, I gotta throw them away and get out of here!  
  
Now I have no idea where I'm running towards now, I'm just running because I don't know what else to do. Maybe if I run fast enough I'll get distracted by some kind of flashing light and find something else to think about. I'll just keep running and.....no, actually I'm running out of breath. I'll just slow down a bit to get my strength to run away back. All right, now where am I?  
  
Oh shit.  
  
I just had to run and stop right near where the accident was. They're fixing the mailbox right now, some people are actually taking some last pictures before the site gets fixed up. And about 5 houses down is Butters house. Butters. I wonder why I'm starting to get mad the more I think about that name? I know I should just turn away now, but this anger feels so justified that I'm not gonna. I'm gonna go right up to his house, as a matter of fact.  
  
Okay, I'm in front of the house now. I can't see him through any of the windows, and that's probably a good thing for him. I always knew letting a lame, goody two shoes Melvin hang out with us was a bad idea, but how could I know it'd be this bad? And who was he to talk about how much Wendy helped him at the eulogy? As if she did more for him than she did for me. Well, guess what pal? I'm the one she fell in love with no matter what stupid shit I did! I'm the one she stayed with even with all the shit she went through cause of me! I'm the one who she made love to the night before she went to your house and then got taken away from me!! Your house, buddy, not mine! You took her away when she should have been at home getting ready for our big date!!  
  
Oh, having someone to feel angry at about this whole thing is working better than I thought! It's even better to think about what I should do to that guy. I should hit him or something to make him see what taking her away from me led me to do. I should punch him a few times at that. I should bash his head in with a lamp or something. I should break his balls like he made her break someone else's balls! I should crush something against his chest and make him lose too much blood to live, then maybe he'll see what a mistake he made!! Then his parents will have to live through the type of hell Ann Testaburger is going through right now, then maybe there'll be a balance in the world again! I should do all that right now if I was more certain that I'd get a free pass by everyone for it!  
  
Well, what do we have here? There he is looking at me through his bedroom window. He looks scared since I probably look real angry, the scared little bitch. Just because he's too much of a fag to be a man, he had to make her fight those dumbass people for him when she should have been with me! That fucking pussy faggot gets to live out his pussy life and she doesn't?!! I swear to God I'm gonna fix that right now!  
  
"WENDY!!!!"  
  
Huh. I was gonna go kill him, but I actually yelled out her name instead. But somehow it looks like it made the guy cry anyway. Look at him through that window, he's crying because I said her name and reminded him that she's dead!  
  
It's almost like.....almost like the way I cried when it got through to me that she died.  
  
I cried like that because I was so unhappy and so sad that I was gonna miss her this much the rest of my life, just like it looks like he does. I mean, the guy's so sensitive that he probably knows this is mostly his fault. It would be just like him to beat himself up and feel horrible about her death because he missed her. Not the way I miss her, but he misses her all the same. Or else why would he have stepped in and given that eulogy to begin with?  
  
So now I want to kill someone who may have had an indirect role in her death at best, and therefore kill someone who's going through the tinest bit of pain that I'll have to live with every single day? Kill someone who misses her and knows first hand why she should be missed? But, but then what am I supposed to do to respond to this? Who can I pass blame to? How can I rationalize this if I can't say it was the fault of one stupid guy? What the fuck am I supposed to feel about anything?!  
  
I gotta get out of here, man, cause I'm not gonna find anything close to an answer here, just more questions I can barely go on to live with.  
  
======================================================  
  
Now as I walk through the valley of snow, I have to remember one other thing I said long ago. When I saved Kyle from dying by getting him Cartman's kidney, I told him that I didn't want him to die until I did. If she had survived, I probably would have said to her "I don't want you to die until I do" too. And I didn't. If I had the chance, could I have given my life for hers if she could live? It would mean I still wouldn't be able to spend my life with her, but would it be a better alternative than having her die and being unable to do all the great, meaningful things as an adult that she always wanted? The more I think of it, the more I think I would have let her have that, even if I had to go to Heaven in her place.  
  
I know that if God exists, a Heaven probably exists, so at least I know she's somewhere. I wonder if she's watching me up there. I wonder if she's ranting and raving at God for doing this to her like I'm doing. I wonder if she knows how cruel it is that all I can do is wonder. And I'll never be able to break out of it until I die along with her. That will be in about 50 years or so with my luck.  
  
God, why did this happen? I know I should be trying to move on. I know I could be labeled as pathetic and a stupid wuss for missing her that much, like I was in that tabloid story. I know she would want me to make the best of my life. A part of me probably does want to move on. But I spent the last 8 years of my life with her. That's enough time to make plans for the rest of my life that all involve....Wendy. Jesus Christ, even after I yelled her name to Butters I can't even think about her name without going crazy! Wendy.....Wendy....how can I live the rest of my life knowing that if Wendy was still with me, I would be so much more happier than I was at that moment? Knowing that every moment of my life from now on would have been better and more forfilling with her around sucks!! And there's absolutly nothing I can do to stop it! Fuck it all to-  
  
Oh shit! If I had gone a few more steps, I would have fallen off this cliff. Jesus, I must have walked really far to get to the  
  
ocal cliff with that frozen river about 500 feet below. I could have been killed and sent right to Heaven with Wendy, that would have finally shut me up and solved all my problems.  
  
Solved all my problems? Boy, I just thought that suicide would solve my problems, I must be nuts. Even though dying would make sure I wouldn't have to think this shit every day, and since I know there's a Heaven I'd be right with Wendy again, then wait about 40 or 50 years for the others to join us so we'd all be together again. If I didn't bring myself to my senses to realize how dumb that is, it would actually sound like a great idea. But in all fairness, I can't really remember it sounding that stupid.  
  
I can't see Wendy again until I die, and since there must be an afterlife I know I'm gonna see her. I'm a good guy and I got screwed over, so God would have to put me in Heaven with her! And all my good friends are good people, so when they die, they'll go to Heaven and we can see them again! Sure, they would be pissed off if I killed myself, but by the time they died and came to Heaven, I'd have all of eternity to get them to forgive me and hang out with me again! Until then I would have Wendy by my side again and I would get to be with her and meet the coolest dead people that ever lived! There's no way I could ever get that pleasure by staying alive! There's nothing left for me here that'll make up for the hell I have to go through now! It would be all gone if I went to Heaven right now!  
  
Wait, I'd better think of the downside to this before I do something dumb. If me and Ann could feel like this because Wendy died, and if I could think it would be better to kill myself because of it....what makes me think that someone wouldn't do this for me? How do I know that my Mom or Dad or Kyle or someone else I know wouldn't be miserable forever if I died? Is that really worth satisfying my own desire to see Wendy in death? I don't want to be remembered as a selfish son of a bitch. But like I said, once they die, I can always make it up to them when they get to Heaven.   
  
I still feel like I have to think about other people's feelings first....but what did caring about other people get me? I want to kill myself because I care so much about another person that this is how I wanna see her again! And now when I have an idea to get us back together, I have to abandon it because I have to care about other people's feelings?! What about my feelings?! God didn't care about any of my feelings when He had Wendy killed, if it's okay for Him not to care about me, why should it be so evil for me not to care about them and let that stop me from seeing Wendy?! Yeah, I'll miss Kyle and Kenny and my parents and Ms Testaburger and a few others, but it's not like I'm really never gonna see them again! Why can't I have something that I deserve until then, like reuniting with the girl I'm in love with and who I lost my virginity to?! I deserve that, not this fucking sham of real life! If I can get it back this way, why shouldn't I take it?!  
  
There is no real reason why I shouldn't take it, that's what!  
  
======================================================  
  
Well, this is it. I went back to town and got a piece of paper and a pencil, wrote my suicide note telling them exactly why I'm doing this and that I'll see them again, now I just need to place the note under a rock on the ground so people will see it. There we go. Now here I am, on the edge of the cliff with my suicide note under a nearby rock, and my chance to see my girlfriend again is just a jump away from happening.  
  
So here I am, about to kill myself. I'm about to leave tons of people and lots of friends behind just to see one girl again. But in return, I get that and an eternity in Heaven because aside from a few small times when I was a jackass to a few people, that's where I'm gonna go. I should take more time to see the downside in that, but the upside looks more and more tempting, so I can't risk chickening out at the last minute! Not when I'm so close.  
  
Therefore, until a few decades from now I have to say goodbye. Goodbye Ann. Goodbye Kenny. Goodbye Butters. Goodbye Bebe. Goodbye Cartman. Goodbye other people in my class. Goodbye Dad. Goodbye Mom.....and goodbye Kyle. I hope they remember how much I cared about all of them and valued their friendship and love as well. True, it wasn't enough love and friendship to stop me from doing this, but I hope they feel some consulation eventually. Oh geez, now I really have to go before I think about what they might do after this again. I really gotta go and.....there I go.  
  
Oh God, this fall is really fast. But Wendy, I'm coming for you now. I'm going to Heaven where good people go, and it doesn't allow any bad people there or people that kill themselves. Hey, wait a minute. I remember Father Maxi saying one day that Widmark wasn't going to Heaven or Hell because he killed himself, he was going to.....wait, wait a minute!! Wait, this isn't fa-  
  
Thud. 


	4. Act 1, Scene 4: Aftermath

Even if Stan had survived the fall, it wouldn't have made a difference since it took hours for anyone to find his corpse. The funeral and the aftermath of a second death in South Park were predictably horrendous to bear. Without Stan around to comfort her, Ann Testaburger soon moved out of South Park to live with other family members from out of town. And soon after graduation, Randy and Sharon Marsh moved out of town too, since Stan was gone and their daughter Shelly had been out of the house for years, which meant no one could stop them from moving.  
  
Without Stan or Wendy there, the high school graduation for the rest of the South Park kids was nothing short of a downer. And even after that, their moods did not change much. Stan's sports friends were upset since they couldn't find a quarterback to face them in their little scrimmages. Kenny and Cartman tried not to show too much emotion since they were more consicious of their image and didn't want to seem like wusses, but at times their grief showed- even Cartman's. True, maybe Cartman was just upset since he couldn't get away with making fun of Stan or Wendy anymore, but him showing any kind of emotion is a rare thing, so who's to question why he did it?  
  
The worst of it naturally fell on Kyle and Butters. For Kyle, he had lost his best friend in the world just moments after he had failed to get him to cheer up a little bit. And now with him and Wendy gone, there was no one left in South Park for him to relate to and no one else was a cool enough kid to possibly take Stan's place. To Kyle, he and Stan were just as much of an important team as Stan and Wendy were, and now he felt almost like Stan when Wendy died- in that his most valued teammate was gone forever and he would never get that kind of friendship back again. Now he too would live the rest of his life wondering what he could have done different and knowing that things he did would have been better if Stan was around to enjoy them with him.  
  
And as for Butters? Well, he was already crushed that he was the last person to see Wendy alive, and now he was probably the last person out of the major kids to see Stan alive. Did he help drive Stan to wanna kill himself or something? If he bore some blame for Wendy's death, didn't that mean he was accountable for Stan's later suicide as well? In an effort to not have to answer for that, he kept himself away from Kyle and the other mourning kids as much as he could. This string of tragedies was something he'd have to work out himself without someone else reminding him of living through what two great kids couldn't.  
  
South Park had always been a dreary mountain town with occasional invasions and world conquest plans to liven it up. But now, with all that had happened, even if Barbra Streisand came back to raise hell, it wouldn't make much of a different in most of the people's moods. People who were going down to South Park were certainly not having themselves a time.  
  
======================================================  
  
Somewhere, in some unknown location that nobody could ever see, not even with telescopes and binoculars, someone could see the plight of the South Park kids. Someone knew all about it. But this someone was on a mission to satisfy this someone's own desires. And the time to begin the mission was almost here.  
  
"I'm close now. It has to happen tonight or it's over before it begins. I've waited long enough for this to happen. I deserve to get what I want and no one's gonna delay giving it to me anymore, not even God Himself. All I need now is him to come back with me. And that shouldn't be too hard at all." The unknown person turned to see that the one to be visited tonight was already heading home, still in the same kind of funk he was in when it all started. "No, it shouldn't be very hard at all."  
  
======================================================  
  
As was becoming the usual case in the Stotch household, Butters returned home from walking around and doing nothing just before dinner, his parents saw that he wasn't in the mood to talk and ignoring him, and he went upstairs to lie around and do nothing some more until dinner, which would be silent and uncomfortable like always. So Butters quickly went to this room and lay on the bed to get a head start. The bed was relatively comfy, but it was a little too hard to focus on that.  
  
Butters hated to be depressed, especially since he had been so used to being happy go lucky and chipper for most of his life. Granted, his cheerfulness and good will made him the target of a lot of narrow minded pricks in school, but at least he could keep himself entertained at some point. Now he didn't see anything that could be fun enough to take his mind off the deaths. His toys, his DVD's, his memories of the good old days, nothing worked.  
  
He knew deep down that there was nothing he could have done for either Wendy or Stan. He really knew that he didn't kill them, and it was dumb to believe he had something to do with making their accidents happen. Therefore, since he wasn't responsible for those events, it should be easier to move on. By God, it had been 4 months since they died, by now he should be ready to play and enjoy himself and not think about it every single day! If he didn't bear any blame for the tragedies, and he didn't, then why couldn't he just move on and stop letting this get to him, like the majority of people other than Kyle seemed to at least be trying to do?!   
  
It was probably because he missed Stan and Wendy so much, but why should it be as much as this? Hell, he didn't even hang out with Stan a lot of the time and those closest to him were at least trying to get on with their lives as normal, except for Kyle! It just....it just was getting to be too much to bear for even the bravest soul, and since Butters wasn't always the strongest kid in the bunch, this was just about ready to break him.  
  
Before he could think about how close he was coming to breaking, he heard a knock on his door and his mother came in about a second later. "Butters, sweetie? Is everything okay?", Linda Stotch asked although she knew her son was far from okay. He didn't answer as a result, so she went to sit down next to Butters on the bed. "You know, I've been taking lessons from Mr Mackey on how to talk to troubled kids who need therapy. This way we wouldn't have to pay lots of money for you to talk to someone that could make you feel better. Now, um, if you want, you can talk to me and I can try my best to tell you everything's gonna be okay. Okay, hon?" Linda waited for any kind of sign that her help was about to be accepted, but Butters still made no movement from lying on the bed, or made any noise at all. She figured she could wait about a few more seconds before she took the hint that he didn't want to talk.  
  
"I saw Kyle today." Butters said that just in time before Linda gave up, so she got herself comfy again to listen to him. "How was he, is he starting to recover a bit?"  
  
"No, not at all. His parents are trying to get his mind off it by getting him ready for college and stuff. But it doesn't look like that's helping a bit. Most of what he said to me was that his whole life that he could remember had Stan involved in someway. He asked how he could do his job as a grownup without thinking about how his time as a kid ended tragically. He knows it's a little gay to think about Stan this much, but he was such a big part of his life that he can't forget about him that easily, and that he can't ever be a part of his adult life too." Butters tried to remember one of the millions of thoughts going around in the brain that he could say to his mom, then he finally found one. "Stan must have known Kyle would feel that way if he killed himself, and he did it anyway. How could he let himself do this to everyone?"  
  
"His note said he did it because he thought he'd meet Wendy in Heaven if he died." Linda pointed out.  
  
"But people that kill themselves don't go to Heaven, they go to Purgatory! Everyone knows that! If Stan had remembered that, Kyle would be okay right now and it would be a lot easier for me to forget about him and about how Wendy's death made him do it and how Wendy's death still hurts too! The, the stupid son of a bitch!" Linda quickly hugged Butters to comfort him so he wouldn't cry right away after cursing out his late friend, and although he sniffed and shed a few tiny tears, he was relatively composed.  
  
"Why d-did this happen, Mom? Stan and Wendy didn't deserve this, so why did they die anyway?"  
  
"Um, well....gee, Mackey's lesson didn't say anything about answering questions like that, the lazy so called expert." Linda shrugged that off and figured she could curse Mackey after this. "Butters, we can't pretend to understand why these things happen, they just do. All we can do is take the punches life gives us as best we can."  
  
"But I've taken so many punches in my life, sometimes literally. I just don't know why it's taking me so long to get up from this one, since I know I shouldn't be this upset." Luckly, Linda didn't need to remember Mackey's teaching to clear Butters up or it might have gotten confusing. "Well, they were your friends. You knew them for over 10 years and you have some very fond memories of them. If they weren't such good people and such good friends to you, then there'd be no reason to be sad for them in the first place."  
  
"That's another thing that's worrying me. Stan was a great guy, but we were never really that close. He used to shun and ignore me like the rest of them, though he wasn't that cruel doing it. I think.....well, lately I think I've been thinking more about how I miss Wendy than how I miss Stan, and that's not right! I should be missing them equally, but I don't think I am!" Butters suddenly went quiet as he actually realized the truth in what he was saying- but like he said, he didn't think it was the right way to think. Yet that may have been what he was doing.  
  
"I suppose that actually makes sense.", started Linda as her son was gathering his thoughts back. "If what that eulogy of yours was true, she certainly did a lot for you than Stan did. Or what me and your father did at that particular time." Linda shook that off, figuring she could come to terms with her own parential mistakes during her meetings with Mackey. "Remember when Julia first moved away and she came over to help you live with that?"  
  
Butters easily remembered that other really painful memory he had, this one from 5 years ago. Julia had to move away thanks to her Dad's job and the goodbye between them had not been free of tears, even after they swore to write to each other all the time like in the old days. But even so, after he'd gotten used to finally being with her everyday, it wasn't easy to have her leave again. After that hard day, Wendy did the most to help him go on after the move. Since she was close friends with Julia and she knew how important Butters was to her, she understood how hard things would be for him and so she visited him several times over the next few days to make sure he was okay. And since she was also upset that one of her good friends had gone away, the time they spent together helped both of them recover, although they did not forget that she was gone. It still wasn't any easier for Butters to not see Julia everyday, even to this day. But in those first few days that could have been really damaging, Wendy cheered him up when he needed it the most, and it helped him go on with day to day life from then on in. So yeah, he remembered that.  
  
"Yeah...I remember that.", Butters said.  
  
"You really liked her and were closer to her than you were to Stan, there's no sense in being ashamed of it now." Butters wasn't that ashamed, but he still felt bad that he didn't have memories of Stan like that which would make things equal. "I guess not. I'm always gonna miss Stan, but it's gonna be a little harder to forget Wendy. She....she was something." Linda was now backed into a corner since she just made Butters miss Wendy more, and she didn't have a way to fix that so he could miss her left. So she decided to count her losses and leave to regroup for tomorrow. But she found one more thing to say just before she walked out the door. "If you died, I'm sure Wendy would have cryed over you, but I'm sure she'd be smart enough to move on with her life and carry on like a trooper, even though she would miss you. Maybe the best way to honor her memory is to do what I think she probably would have done, to carry on with your life and do your best so that all the help she gave you wasn't in vain." Linda quickly headed out and went downstairs to cheer her last minute success.  
  
Butters lay back on his bed to take that in. Wendy had helped him several times and if he just gave up now, all that would be for nothing indeed. She somehow believed that he had the right to have as good a time as the cooler kids did, and he would just be proving her wrong if he didn't be the best he could be to honor her. Yeah, that really was something she would think, wouldn't it?  
  
The boy shot up with a momentary shock of confidence and joy, just before it faded back away when he saw Wendy and Stan's picture. He had retrived the picture he gave Wendy on that night and kept it for himself to pay tribute to them, and with that around, it reminded him that his best work wouldn't take away the fact they were dead. Butters went back to having a heavy heart. He did still want to carry on, but it really wasn't gonna be that simple. It never is when you lose a friend like Stan even though they weren't that close and he probably wanted Butters dead near the end. But it definatly wasn't easy when you lose a friend like Wendy who was smart and nice to him at time when others weren't, and who was popular and thoughtful and beautiful.....wait, that was a strange thing to think about her at a time like this. Even though after Julia left, Wendy was probably the most attractive girl left in his school and, he had to admit, it was for a pretty good reason....  
  
This time Butters had to smack himself on the forehead to get those thoughts out of his head. He couldn't think that way when she was alive since she was Stan's girlfriend, so why should he think that way now when she was dead? The thing was she was dead, and it was time to make an effort to live a normal life again afterwards. So he went downstairs to watch TV and to wait for dinner, like a normal kid would.  
  
======================================================  
  
Someone from above saw that Butters was almost finished dinner and was about to turn in for the night. It was now time to use the spell to come down and wait for him.  
  
"Anya kon wa. Anya kon nina pac. Anya kon eagle stripe! Anya kon baya audios!" After repeating the phrase a few more times, the spell was complete. And her quest was now almost ready to begin.  
  
======================================================  
  
At around 9:00, Butters said good night to his mom and dad and headed up to his room. He figured that tomorrow he might try to see Kyle and the others again and offer to go somewhere with them. Spending time with another person helped him after Julia left, so maybe it would help him and the others to do that now. But that wouldn't be possible without a good night's sleep first. So he headed inside his room and closed the door to have some privacy before he put his P.J's on.  
  
But then he turned to see a girl already sitting on his bed. A very familar, but dead, girl.  
  
"Wendy?!!"  
  
Butters could see that a girl who looked like Wendy was on his bed, but he regained his compose to remember that she was dead. At that point, he started to get mad. "Eric sent you, didn't he? He wanted to tease me by making me think Wendy came back to life! Well I'm not that dumb anymore, so you can just go away!"  
  
"But Butters, it's really me." My God, she even sounded like Wendy. Eric sure got her to do a great impression, Butters thought. But it was a very cruel impression, and he didn't need to deal with it right now. "You heard me, go away! Tell Eric he can't do this kind of shit to me now!" But the Wendy impersinator wouldn't go away, in fact, she moved closer to him. "I know you don't believe it's me, but I can prove it by-" By then Butters really didn't want his emotions to be toyed with anymore, so although he didn't like being physical with anyone, he figured this would have to be an exception.  
  
"I said get out, now go away and stop toying with me!" With that he moved to grab the girl by the arm- but instead, his arm went through her.  
  
After the inital shock of the year wore off, he tried to grab her again, but again he couldn't grab her because his hand went through her arm. He kept reaching and trying to grab something, but he just went through her like she was invisible. But he could see her right in front of her, so how....by God, he was actually seeing things! It must be a hallucination thingie, he must be going crazy! Butters figured he'd better call his parents before he went even more insane! "Mom, Da-"  
  
But he stopped because the girl put her hand right onto his mouth to cover his screams. He couldn't touch her, but she seemed perfectly able to touch him. So she took advantage of this position to explain.  
  
"You aren't imagining this, Butters. You didn't just go to sleep, so this isn't a dream either. This is real. I'm the real Wendy Testaburger, your name is Leopold "Butters" Stotch, and you gave me that picture on your wall for me and Stan's anniversary before I died. You gave my eulogy and told everyone about how I defended you from bullies in high school. I know that Stan killed himself to get to me about two weeks later. And I know you just told your mother how much you miss me and Stan as a result." As she talked, she managed to get Butters to sit down, which he did since he was too numb from all of this to do anything but listen. "I am Wendy Testaburger, and I used a spell from Heaven to come here and visit you. I came here because I need your help."  
  
Butters tried to answer but he couldn't since his mouth was still covered by the girl's hand. "If I promise to let you talk again, will you promise not to scream or call for your Mom and Dad? This is between me and you and it won't work if other living people know about this. I need to tell you a lot of things and I need you to realize that I'm not joking. I'm for real. I know everything Wendy knows because I am Wendy, your friend and the girl who had to kiss you in 4'th grade to end that period when you had a crush on me." And that obscure detail was enough to convince Butters who this really was. So he shook his head to make his promise and the hand let go of him. With that, Butters tried to compose himself before he looked at this, for lack of a better word, spirit. The spirit of the late Wendy Testaburger.  
  
"What....what are you doing here?" 


	5. Act 1, Scene 5: The Proposal

"Stan was right about one thing. I did go to Heaven after I died, and I was lucky. Apperantly they used to only allow Mormons in Heaven, but since dead political correct people had been bugging God lately, He's been allowing more people of different beliefs to come in. And I was able to slide in even though I had killed someone before. Am I making sense so far?"  
  
Making sense? A ghost was in Butters room talking to him, and since he wasn't sleepy he had to assume that this was for real, and she was giving evidence that further proved it. At this point, sense had been thrown out the window the minute Butters entered the room. But Butters merely brought himself to nod so she could go on.  
  
"So like you said earlier today, Stan killed himself to get to me in Heaven, but of course people who kill themselves still aren't allowed. God's bent a lot of the old rules to be P.C, but He really is staying firm about keeping that one alive. After all my pleas, I'd say He really doesn't want to budge. So here I am stuck in Heaven while the love of my former life is trapped in Purgatory forever, and I really never will see him again! At least not if this thing fails."  
  
"What thing? Why did you say you needed my help for whatever the thing is?" Butters asked with a lot of worry. He'd seen enough ghost movies to know that there might be a chance he wouldn't make it through the night here. But then again, this was Wendy and she wouldn't hurt him- unless she went insane from losing Stan forever or something, ghosts are driven to revenge and killing for lesser reasons than that according to TV! He held his hands tightly to prepare for the worst as Wendy continued.  
  
"I've spent 4 months in Heaven trying to find some angle I can use to get to Stan. And recently, I finally found one. In Heaven, there's a group of people that specialize in taking the souls of the living, they're kind of the bad boys and girls of the dead. They have the power to go from Heaven to the Earth and to any other kind of land. They're banned from using their spells to go to Hell and Purgatory, but the spells they used to use to go there still exist! If I can get into their group, I can find the spells they used to go to Purgatory, and use them to go there and get Stan back! That's why I'm here." At this point, Butters willed himself to think clearly again, and after analyzing what she was saying, he suddenly got an idea of what she was actually here to do. "So you're here to get into their group? How are you gonna do that?" Okay, he hadn't gotten it yet, but Wendy figured she should clear it up quick so she could get this done quicker.  
  
"I have to kill someone and take their soul back to Heaven, then I'll be a part of the soul taking group and then I can find those spells. And so, that means I have to, well...." Wendy knew she had to be very careful in saying this, since Butters was usually a nervous person and finding out something like this would give him a heart attack. But then again, that might make it easier to do the deed, so maybe it wouldn't be so bad. However, since his sounds of panic would make his parents come up, she went back to trying to make it easy on him. "I have to take you to Heaven."  
  
"You mean you gotta kill me?!!" Well, so much for that little plan. Wendy quickly covered Butters mouth again so he wouldn't make any more noise. But he still spoke and spoke his panic in muffled tones. Wendy had to calm him down right away and tell him the rest of the story, since she couldn't do this without his consent. Of course the soul takers group never asked for permission to take souls, but for Wendy's special and secret mission, it was nessecary.  
  
"Butters, calm down a second! Yes, I actually do have to kill you, but not perminently! Before I came down here, I perfected an old spell that can send souls back to their bodies, and when I'm finished, I'll do that for you! You'll be brought back to life as soon as I'm reunited with Stan!" That actually seemed to make Butters look less likely to scream, so Wendy took her hand off his mouth and went on more gently. "I can't go through this thing without someone around to help me, and I can't tell any of the dead people about my plan or else they'll tell on me to God! I need someone I can trust and someone who knows how important it is for me to see Stan again to help me. That's why I need you." She then held Butters hand with her special power to touch the living while the living couldn't touch her at all.   
  
"We'll go back to Heaven together, and then after I help you get settled in Heaven to impress the group, we'll work together to find a way into Purgatory, and then sneak Stan outta there to live with me in Heaven forever! You and I both know he belongs there and he belongs there with me, it's an injustice that must be fixed!" She let go of Butters and sat back on the bed. "I know I'm asking a lot, but I really need you to ignore that for both me and Stan's sake. Please let me kill you so you can help me find Stan again, please?"  
  
Butters wanted to faint or pass out or doing anything to have more time to think this over. It was one thing to have the ghost of Wendy here, and another to ask him to go to Heaven with him and possibly into Purgatory too- but to top it off, she wanted him to die too! He couldn't do that, could he? Sure, he had been miserable as Hell and he missed his friends a lot, but not so much that he wanted to die just like Stan wanted to die! And who's to say that this really isn't a dream or some hallucination? And even if it wasn't, he couldn't very well leave life behind forever just to get Wendy and Stan back together! He saw the pain and suffering that happened to Kyle and the Marshes and Ms Testaburger. He couldn't put his family through that kind of torture by dying himself.  
  
"Butters, let me just say something else to sweeten the deal. Like I said earlier, I can bring you back to life when my plan works, and I will. When it's over, I'll cast a spell that will transport your soul back in your body at the exact split second that I took it away. At that point, no one will know you died and it'll be like nothing ever happened."  
  
"But, but what if your plan doesn't work? What if something goes wrong and I have to stay in Heaven and be dead forever?" It was just like Butters to think of the worst at these times, but this time he had a good reason to, as Wendy knew. But she wasn't gonna let that get in the way. "If the worst happens and I can't see Stan, I'll still send you back. Even though they'll probably find out that I sent a dead soul back to be alive again, and that'll get me punished somehow. But the greatest punishment for me is never seeing Stan again! Not to mention knowing that if he had just waited to die naturally, I would have seen him again in another 5 years when he drank himself to death on the anniversary of my demise! I can't live my afterlife with that and I won't, and I don't care what I have to do to do that! Nothing is too far for me here!"  
  
"Not even killing one of your friends and risking that he could be dead forever?" Butters answered quickly, thinking that that may just be the excuse he could use to get out of this.  
  
"All right, I know that sounds bad too, but I told you I won't let that happen. Butters, you are my friend, and I need a friend that I can trust and count on to help me with this thing. I'm willing to trust you with helping me with the most important thing I ever have to do. Don't you trust me enough to know that I wouldn't thank you for your help by letting you get the shaft? That's what Stan and the others used to do to you in 4'th grade and that's what the bullies did in the other schools, but it isn't something that I do, and you know that!" That was true. If it wasn't, then there was no way Butters would have worked so hard on that eulogy.  
  
"I, I do trust you but, I'm, I'm still not sure. I know I should think more clearly about this. Stan didn't think too clearly before he jumped off and now you're here as a result, so-" Wendy then lept up and remembered her final selling point. "That's just it, Stan is suffering. From what I've heard, Purtagory has fallen under the control of someone who must not be named. Everyone's too scared to tell me who this person is, only that it's someone so dangerous that both God and Satan have left him alone to rule Purgatory in whatever way he wants! And since he's someone evil, you know he must be doing something horrible to Stan because of it!"  
  
"Oh jeez, it's Widmark, isn't it? He killed himself so he must be in Purgatory too, it's gotta be him getting revenge on Stan!" Butters figured that was logical considering how Stan had stopped him from killing Wendy for the murder of Widmark's daughter, but Wendy answered, "That's what I thought too, but it's not him. I heard that Widmark got sent to Hell by this unnamed dictator a few years back, and again, because God and Satan really want nothing to do with this guy, they're letting him do whatever he wants."  
  
"So we gotta go to Heaven and face this nameless guy to get Stan back too?!" Now Wendy cursed herself for making Butters even more scared, but now knew she had to stop wasting time and get him to go already. "Butters, I know this is plently scary but I need you to do this!" Now fearing that the details of the Purgatory dictator would make Butters want to stay alive, Wendy got even more desperate and looked right into Butters's eyes. "I'm desperate here! I've been through Hell although I'm in Heaven, and the one who I should be spending eternity with is going through God doesn't know what kind of torture! I need to get him out! I need to be with him again! And I need you to help me!" Now that she was coming close to crying, she tried to finish quickly before she lost it. "I swear to you, on my former life and Stan's, I won't let you stay dead and I won't let anything else happen to you because you're helping me. I don't know what else I can say! Wait, I know! You never got to say goodbye to me and Stan! Wouldn't it make you feel a lot better to say a proper goodbye after seeing us reunited thanks to your help? Wouldn't that make you feel less bad about our deaths and make you stop thinking it was your fault?"  
  
He would have given anything to stop thinking that when he was at his lowest point. But who was he to really brag about a lowest point? If this was real, Stan was going through torture because he wanted to see Wendy again, and now he couldn't ever do that. And Wendy wasn't happy in Heaven like she deserved because Stan did all this. And now that she had the chance to fix that and spend all of time with him like they should have....how would it make Butters feel to turn them down and deny them that one final shot to be together? He felt bad enough in what his role was in their deaths, but that might pale in comparison to how he would feel to screw them over after their deaths like this.  
  
But then there was the whole problem of having to die! He couldn't let Wendy do that to him, although she gave him his word that she'd put him back. But would Wendy lie and sacrifice his life just so she could see Stan again? Would she lie that she could put him back just to trick him into doing this? She loved Stan so much that she killed a teacher to get her away from him, so wouldn't it be logical that she could kill him to get back together with him?  
  
No, no, that was the old Wendy. He only had to take one look at the Wendy before him to see that she probably wouldn't do that to him. Yet this thought was coming from someone who kept falling for Cartman's cruel pranks and jokes because he was so naive and stupid! But Wendy did a lot to stop people from doing that to him in high school. She knew better now than to sacrifice people like this to get her way. And he and Wendy have, or had, been friends for a long time, long enough so that she wouldn't think of lying to him for something like this. Long enough so that she wouldn't think of asking him to do this if she didn't really need him, and if she didn't really think she could count on him to do something this important. She valued his help and thought it would be valuable in such an important mission. How could he tell her that he didn't want that responsibility because he was being selfish? He wouldn't do that to her when she was alive, if she wanted his help then he would have done it because she would do the same thing for him. That's what friendship is all about, and it should be that way even after death. At least that's what he was starting to get.  
  
"You promise that I'll be okay doing this?"  
  
"I promise."  
  
"Then....okay. I'll do it." Butters was nervous to say this, but he calmed down after he saw how happy this had made Wendy. But before she started whatever she was gonna do to kill him, he had to get one more thing straight. "Will, will this hurt?"  
  
"I know a way to do this so quick that you won't feel a thing. I'll see you on the other side, and...thank you." Wendy gave Butters her sweetest and most thankful smile, and Butters was a lot more calm after seeing that. He did miss seeing her smile like that and, after all this confusion, it was very comforting to see her again.  
  
At that point Wendy took Butters head in her hands and twisted it around, snapping his neck and spine and killing him instantly without any lasting pain.  
  
Wendy caught Butters before he fell to the floor and put him on his bed. Then she began the spell that the group taught her to take the soul out of the body. "Baya sim tumbo die to life. Baya simbo die to life again. Baya die to life and back again. Baya die baya die baya die!"  
  
With that, Wendy took Butters lifeless hand, which then lifted when the spirit of Butters rose from his body and was now holding on to Wendy's hand. Wasting no time, she cast the spell that would bring the two of them to Heaven. "Baya kum by heav, baya kum tu baya heaven back! Heaven back tum ba aidos!"  
  
And a second later, a light covered the two spirits and transported them out of room. Only the body of Butters remained. If Wendy's plan worked correctly, she would transport Butters soul back into the body at this very second before his parents saw him. But for now, there was a mission to be done and a reunion in Heaven to plan.  
  
END OF ACT I  
  
Act II, Scenes 1-3 to come on July 19'th. 


	6. Act 2, Scene 1: Arrival to Heaven

The legends of Heaven and the theories about what it really is have plagued men and women for longer than we care to remember. Some have taken a fanatical devotion to their own version of Heaven and what awaits those that go there, which explains the existance of suicide bombers. Heaven is definatly one of the most debated things in existance although some don't believe it exists- but the difference is that there is no way to prove it's existence without giving up the right to come back to Earth and to life. Of course, one of the big reasons Butters allowed Wendy to take him up there was because she could bring him back to Earth afterwards, so perhaps there is a first time for everything.  
  
But for now, this kind of rational thought was put on the backburner as Butters was just getting over the shock of being killed and having himself lifted from his body and into.....into a place where it looked like he was on top of a cloud. It was nighttime at this place and he was walking on an invisible flat surface with Wendy. In fact, when he looked down, he could almost see a whole city right below him when the cloud below cleared. Of course, the sensation of being high up above a city didn't settle Butters's fears too well, so he backed away in panic.  
  
"Don't worry, this is Heaven, there's no way we can fall all the way down to Earth. That kind of spell was destroyed centuries ago." Wendy got Butters to stop cringing and to get back to where he was. "Come on, it's about a 20 minute walk to where we're gonna stay."  
  
======================================================  
  
The most popular image of Heaven is that of a bright sunny place with clouds and angels everywhere. But it clearly wasn't sunny right now, which was, according to Wendy, because the dead followed a schedule of day and night just like the living did, with the sun out in the early hours and the stars out at night. In fact, all the stars didn't look that high up from where the two were walking- Butters figured if there was a trampoline here, it would be easy to jump up and grab one of those things. But since they looked too sharp and would cut his hand pretty good, he quickly dismissed that possibility.  
  
During their whole walk, all Butters could see was darkness, clouds, and a few more clouds. There were no angels or former lifeforms anywhere, and Wendy explained that it was because they were in one of the deserted parts of Heaven. As it turns out, Heaven is divided into many many towns and cities, and the parts of Heaven that don't have people and buildings in it are just left bare. They would arrive in the town they were staying at in a matter of moments. Which was just as well since this whole area with nothing around but clouds was starting to creep Butters out.  
  
Finally they stopped to see a relatively big cloud right in front of them. "This is pretty much the border to my Heaven town, you just gotta climb over it to get in. It really gets easier with a lot of practice." Wendy tried to make her point by climbing on the cloud and was somehow able to grab onto it and climb to the top. "Hey, wait a minute, can't you just go around the cloud or something?" Butters commented since it didn't look like there was anything there to stop you from going around the cloud, and it looked a lot safer anyway. "No, they put in invisible borders there, it keeps the annoying people from the other towns from coming in easier. This way once they hear them climb the cloud and fall down, they won't be taken by surprise when some dead telemarketer or other annoying guy comes to bug them. Come on."  
  
It was hard enough wrapping his brain around that logic without worrying how to climb the cloud, there didn't seem to be anything he could hold on to- it was just a cloud. But since going around it was out, he took a deep breath and jumped, hoping to grab on to part of the cloud. He couldn't do it the first time, or the second time, so on the third time he jumped and tried to use his hands to climb it by sheer force, but fell back down. So finally when he jumped again, Wendy just reached down and grabbed his hand before he fell again, and she tried to pull him up to the top. Since he was a little heavy, this was a little difficult, so just before Butters got up the top, Wendy lost her balance and fell about 6 feet to the ground- or whatever kept the dead from falling down to Earth. Butters quickly jumped over the cloud to see if she was allright, but he fell flat on his stomach too as a result of his jump. As he got up, he saw that Wendy was already up and talking to someone he couldn't see. "It's not a telemarketer or some other annoying dead guy, it's just me! You can go back to bed now!" She turned to help Butters back on his feet. "See what I mean about paranoid dead people?"  
  
Butters wasn't exactly seeing that since he was too busy seeing everything else in front of him. There were about two rows of small suburban like houses stretching out as far as the eye can see. Most of the houses had their lights out and it looked like everyone living there was already in bed since no one else was outside. It was almost like they had stumbled onto a regular suburb on Earth.  
  
"I know, great likeness of the suburbs, isn't it?", Wendy pointed out. "These houses go on for about a few miles, then we have an area of the biggest buildings where people work at. One of them is where the soul takers group is at, and we'll be seeing a lot of them tomorrow. But other than them, this place is just full of normal people who lost their lives and are picking up where they left off here."  
  
"Do they have wings and halos and stuff like the dead people on TV? And how many dead famous people live here?" Now that the shock was starting to wear off, Butters's natural curiousity and eagerness to learn was coming back and beginning to make him a bit excited about what to expect here. "Actually, we don't get a lot of famous people in this area, they usually live in the bigger towns in Heaven. Some of the big stars show up when the soul takers have a big show, like the one they'll have tomorrow to introduce me as their new member." Apperantly done talking for now, Wendy started to walk in between the two rows of houses. "Come on, we should get to my place soon so we can get our rest!" Having no other choice and figuring he could always ask his other questions in a comfy house, Butters ran off to follow her.  
  
======================================================  
  
The two walked by the two long rows of houses until Wendy stopped at a house near the end of the first row. "Here's my place. They wanted me to have a house in one of the busy parts of Heaven since I was famous, but I wanted this quieter part so I could work on my plans with less distractions." Butters had to chuckle at that since after she was dead for 4 months, it was refreshing to hear Wendy talk in one of her long winded fancy speeches again. But by the time he finished remembering that, she had already walked up to her doorstep, so he quickly ran to catch up with her.  
  
The house was relatively wide and was covered in purple paint, and it had two stories in it like the rest of the houses in the area. Wendy got out a key and opened the door to come in and show off the inside of the house to her guest. Inside, there was a relatively small living room with a couch against a wall and a shelf of books next to it. As Wendy explained earlier, some of the dead writers in Heaven liked to continue their work here and she had collected a few of their stories- though she wasn't too fond of how Shakespeare sold out and published sequel after sequel to Hamlet, she stopped reading them after the 6'th one. Butters noticed there wasn't a TV around in the room. "So, aside from these books and no TV in here, how do you keep yourself busy?"  
  
"Mostly by planning out how I'm gonna see Stan again, that takes up most of the day. I figure once Stan is brought back here we can find our own little things to keep busy, just like the good old days." Now Wendy got lost in her thoughts a bit as the good old days briefly ran through her head. They would be so much more fun around here since the couple could do anything they wanted and they couldn't die. And although you couldn't very well give birth to people here, which ended Wendy's dreams of starting a family with Stan, they could still do the special thing they did the night before her death and he didn't even need to worry about using a condom! What would he need it for here? Oh yes, that glorious time wouldn't be too long away now, especially after tomorrow night and-  
  
"Wendy? Are you in one of those trances or something? Ooh, I was in a lot of those when I kept thinking about you and Stan dying, which kind are you in? The one where you think about the good old days or the one where you can't stop thinking about death or what other kind?" Wendy had snapped out of it at around the part where he asked about the good old days kind of trance. So she composed herself and went on with the tour. Since the living room and the kitchen and the lack of TV weren't that much to talk about, that part of the tour ended quickly, so she went upstairs to show Butters his room.  
  
The second floor of the house really just consisted of a hallway and one door on each side. The door on the right was the door to Wendy's room, which became obvious when Wendy opened the other door and showed Butters inside. Inside was a small bedroom without a lot of extra accesories other than a bed. "This is my guest room. Sorry I wasn't able to make it too pretty, but like I said, I've been busy making plans in my own room. I'm sure this should hold up for a few nights though." Butters walked over to the bed and sat on it, and after rocking up and down on it a few times he figured it would indeed do.  
  
"We should probably get an early rest now. Tomorrow we'll go to the busy part of town and have a nice breakfast. The head of the soul takers group will be there to make sure I killed you and passed my initiation. At that point I'll go with him to plan out the party in my honor later. You can feel free to take a tour of Heaven while I'm gone, then we'll meet up to go to their party together, and find the Purgatory spells when we get there."  
  
"I guess I could stand to take a little tour until then. Heck, it's not like I'm going anywhere!" Butters almost had to force himself to laugh at the situation he just described. But then again, who knows when he would really die and have a chance to go back here again- he could make some friends now that would make it easier for him to live here when he died for real. For now though, it'd probably be best to focus on this first visit and the jobs at hand in the future. "So, I should just get some sleep till tomorrow?"  
  
"Unless you wanna go exploring now with the darkness and no one else around, and with all the dead people inside their houses."  
  
"On second thought, I'm good till tomorrow." Wendy knew Butters would say that and she couldn't help but laugh. Though she didn't like to rip on Butters like the others did, having a nice laugh now wouldn't hurt, especially with the seriousness of the upcoming situation. "Well Butters, unless you have any more questions, I should let you get some sleep. And we'll have plently of time to go over the rest of this at breakfast tomorrow. Good night." Wendy exited the guest room before Butters remembered to ask her how they could get food into Heaven.  
  
There didn't seem to be any drawers or other clothes to get into, so Butters was left with no choice but to sleep in his day clothes. He got under the strange covers in his strange new bed, and was left with nothing to do but listen to nothing. Just 20 minutes ago he was looking forward to doing this in his own bed, now he was doing the same thing in Heaven after he had died. Go figure. Too bad there weren't even any books or toys to play around with to keep him occupied. All he had were the same thoughts he'd had for the last half hour- the shock of seeing a ghost/spirit, the more immense shock of seeing Wendy again, the task that she was asking him to help with and the sacrifice he had already made, the thoughts of Stan being enslaved by some unknown guy in Purgatory, other such things.  
  
But although he was afraid, Butters had been through worse. If he could survive even living in a town like South Park until tonight, and survive the cruelest type of shit imaginable from his friends and peers, perhaps going through the stuff Heaven and Purgatory had to offer wouldn't be so bad. Plus he had Wendy to protect him if the worst went down. And since he was already dead, how could the worst hurt him that badly?  
  
At that point he figured he had to go to sleep now before he thought of ways that it could hurt.  
  
======================================================  
  
Across the hall, Wendy's room was filled with blueprints and notes about the soul takers group and their building where they would honor her tomorrow night. She had spent almost every day since Stan's death researching them, gaining their trust to let them join the group, and then talking them into giving her an assignment to take a soul. Now that she had a soul with her in the next room, it was safe to say the plan was working perfectly so far.  
  
"Phase one complete. Phase two, get the Purgatory spells during the get together for me tomorrow. With Butters help it should be a little less difficult. Phase three, take the spells and find the one that will take me to Purgatory. Then I get Stan, maim whatever guy that must not be named is in my way, and we live happily ever after as I used to think God intended for us." It was going to be the perfect plan. She would worry about the aftermath later, and she would worry about God finding out what she did and coming after her later. God would be pissed that she took Stan away from where he technically belonged, but what did she owe Him? She was reversing God's mistake and she wasn't gonna give Him another chance to make it.  
  
8 years of countless ordeals and near death experiences together wouldn't end like this. Wendy was gonna go to bed and put away her new notes, then go to sleep convinced that it wasn't ending that way after all. There really wasn't anything in Heaven, Hell, Earth, or Purgatory that could make her back off now or ever- hell, the powers that be knew she killed before to get Stan back at her side, they should have known she'd go this far to do it again, why would they be surprised? It was pointless to think she would let this go without a fight, so this was their fault for being dumb and shortsighted! The bastards!  
  
But she had spent too many horrible nights cursing the powers that be for putting her in this situation, tonight wasn't the night to do it again, not after such progress had been made. She got herself under the covers and decided to take the advice she gave Butters earlier, to go to sleep. A long day and night was coming tomorrow, and rest was vital to be prepared for it. But it was worth reminding that nothing was gonna stop her from making it a succesful long day and night.   
  
"Abso-fucking-lutly nothing is stopping me now...." 


	7. Act 2, Scene 2: Party Plans

The next day, the traditional visual of Heaven being a bright sunny place with bright white clouds all around was in full swing. In Wendy and Butters's part of Heaven, many of the dead people got up, read the Heaven newspaper, and checked out all the bad news on Earth which made them happy that they died when they did. As Wendy had explained the previous night, over the last few decades the parts of Heaven had evolved to be almost like the towns on Earth. People had jobs, they provided for family members when they finally came up to Heaven, they used special Heaven money to pay for things, and lived regular lives up here. So those people who expected Heaven to be a different and far better place than Earth was very much wrong in a way. Sure it was different since there were no murders and no need for violence since you couldn't get hurt perminantly, but the idea of it's living conditions being different was very overrated. This is why a lot of people moved to the big cities of Heaven to make up for the disappointment and to least have some hustle and bustle in their second lives.  
  
As for our two kids, they were now at the hustle and bustle part of the town. They were walking past stores and workplaces and some semi large buildings where the richest people in this town worked. Surprisingly, the stores had almost the same kind of products on sale as Earth did, even though you can't take possessions with you when you die. Wendy told Butters that over the centuries, enough people had managed to make their own equipment to build houses and gadgets and the like, and enough people remembered food recipes so that all kinds of food could be made just like on Earth. This was in their favor, since they were headed for lunch to eat some of those types of food.  
  
They found a small lunch shop at about the middle of the town and sat themselves down. Of course, since Wendy knew that the people in Heaven made it their first task to remember how to reprint money, she knew there was Heaven money unlike Butters, and she had enough to pay for the meal. Luckly the menu had at least one of Butters's favorite foods, a large bowl of Tricks, so he had that while Wendy had a salad as an appetizer, then some pancakes. She didn't really care what she ordered as long as it had no meat in it, because she was just waiting for him to show up. This was his favorite place to go for lunch and she needed him to get here to show him she had succeeded in her task.  
  
About a second later, she heard the door open and heard someone walking slowly into the resteraunt. She knew it was him and she turned to greet him. "Marvin? Marvin Marsh?! It's me with my catch from last night!"  
  
Butters had pretty much reached his threshold of being shocked and stunned last night, but he made room to be particually stunned this one last time. Stan Marsh's very own grandfather, Marvin Marsh, who died about 2 1/2 years ago after pleading for death for countless years, was coming up to their table. In fact, he was walking up despite his still old age and the fact he had to use a wheelchair when he was alive. But since he now knew that people are automatically well enough to walk again in Heaven if they couldn't walk on Earth, it wasn't too surprising to Butters that he didn't need a wheelchair, though he was taking his sweet time getting here. Finally after about 30 seconds, he got to the table.  
  
"Mr Marsh, you remember Butters, he used to be one of "Billy"'s friends. And I killed him just like I said I would." Wendy said confidently. Grandpa Marsh bent down and ignored his bones cracking as a result, since he was too busy examining Butters to make sure it was really him. Butters just looked uneasily at the man since he didn't know how else to react at him being 2 inches away from his face. But at last, Grandpa Marsh put on a smile and backed away to turn towards Wendy. "I always knew you still had that killer instinct in you! So how'd you put him outta his misery, huh? No wait, save it for tonight, I'm sure the story will be a hit at our party!"  
  
"You're the head of the soul takers group?" For once, Butters knew about a second after he asked a dumb question that he'd asked a dumb question, since it seemed pretty obvious that Mr Marsh was the leader already. But he figured he just had to make sure, and soon enough he was sure. "Yep, that's me, Billy's dead friend! What, you think I wasn't too bitter about having to live those last 20 horrible years of my life that I didn't want to take others down with me, hell no! I organized the soul takers in Heaven and made them come together for the first time in centuries, and now here we are with our own club! Now I get to choose who dies before or after their death and who gets to take them down, it's the job I wanted to die to get decades ago!" Grandpa Marsh turned to Wendy with a bigger smile that showed his fixed up teeth. "And now with this little famous lady joining our club, we're gonna get more attention than ever after tonight!"  
  
"That's just what I joined up for! Say, I figured I could come over after lunch and make sure this party in my honor is going smoothly. I think I earned it after a night of breaking this guy's spine." Now even more impressed with Wendy's killing abilities, Grandpa Marsh was more eager to grant her request. "Oh, that was the 3'rd best way that I wanted to die if Billy would have let me! Sure, come over and greet your new co-workers! You'll have to leave before 4 so you can get ready for your big night though. And bring your victim with you so everyone can see how ruthless you were to take him away." Wendy nodded at the ease in which the old man was falling into her trap like she had planned out for weeks. "I'll do that. I'll come over and discuss things with you guys in a minute, then come back tonight with my catch here!"   
  
The two soul takers laughed some more and talked a bit more about tonight as Butters just watched them go, more than a little uneasy that they were joking and about to celebrate his death- especially since he was sure his parents were wishing they were dead with him right now after seeing his body on Earth. But once again, Butters had to will himself to grin and bear this unusual, deadly, and still dangerous turn of events to come.  
  
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When they finished lunch, Butters and Wendy split up like they originally planned. Wendy went off with Grandpa Marsh to go to the soul taker group's headquarters and make last minute plans for tonight. Butters was allowed to wander around Heaven and look around, then he'd have to return to the house by the end of the afternoon to get ready for tonight. Wendy also gave him some money in case he could find some clothes or other accesories to wear for the occasion.  
  
So Butters was basically left alone to fend for himself in Heaven for the next few hours. As he walked around, he saw that this area was indeed like South Park, only surrounded by far better scenery. There were small time buildings and stores, people walking around buying stuff, and he even saw some little kids walking around[due to the fact that people did not age after they died]The differences between Heaven and South Park was that Heaven was not filled with greedy and often very stupid people, and the corrupt people were stuck in Hell or Purgatory. This was basically how a small part of a town was supposed to work and how South Park would work if more than a few adults had an active brain. Since Butters rarely ever went to places other than South Park, he had to be impressed with this place by comparison. Heck, if he was in South Park, he'd have probably run into a hobo by now!  
  
"Spare change? Spare change, mister?" As usual in times like this, Butters thought and/or spoke too soon. He turned to see what kind of hobos were populating Heaven, but then got yet another shock when he saw who was beside a building and wearing several day old rags.   
  
"Miss.....Miss Ellen?!"  
  
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Far away from this scene was the location of the Soul Takers Group, the largest building in this part of Heaven. Since Marvin Marsh started the group, he had indeed organized all the free lancing people in Heaven who took people's souls, and the organization had grown to be one of Heaven's most profitable and famous businesses. Now the people who worked there were getting ready for tonight's big get together to honor the addition of Wendy into the group.  
  
The soul takers building had a lobby at the front, and then straight ahead there was an extravegant and large ballroom filled with tables and a podium for the festivities. There, Wendy, Grandpa Marsh, and a few other key members of the group were discussing the interary for the party.  
  
"So now that she's passed her test, she's ready to be made an official member and the party is on to make it official." Grandpa started.  
  
"Wow, I thought you were ruthless when you said you wanted to kill a friend for your first time, but to do it like this! I'm starting to get worried that you'll rise to the top too fast!" commented one of the more experienced soul takers. "So how does it stack up? How does killing someone while you're alive compare to killing someone while you're dead?"  
  
"I wouldn't really know, I blocked out a lot of my memories from the first time I killed someone. I mean, it did happen when I was 8 and a lot's happened to me since then." Wendy was used to their questions about her past by now, but it was all part of her job to gain their trust so it'd be easier to steal their spells from under their nose.  
  
"So how did the guy take it when you showed up and told him he was gonna die?" asked another future co-worker of Wendy's. "You said it was gonna be easy to get him since he'd be less likely to fight back than your other friends."  
  
"That's right, I was right. He was pretty much too stunned to see me, so snapping his spine wasn't that hard. But I got him to calm down after we got back, and he shouldn't bring down the mood too much when I bring him here tonight."   
  
"That's good to hear, I heard he was one of Billy's foo-foo sissy friends anyway." Grandpa Marsh said in response to Wendy's answer, then he kept on going with his memories of Butters. "I always heard Billy and the Jewish kid and the fat kid talk about how lame that kid was behind his back, it sounded like he was quite a pussy pants!" He couldn't help but laugh at his own choice of words, which was more than could be said for Wendy. "Well Mr Marsh, remember that they did that stuff about 8 years ago, they didn't know any better back then."  
  
"What do you mean, you're the one who said he was a scardy cat!" replied the older member of Grandpa's subordinates. "And from all those stories you told about you having to save his ass from bullies and cool kids, he really does seem like a little pushover and a coward! I left Earth several decades ago, but I knew life there didn't change enough so that goody two shoes pansies like him were allowed to live torture free lives!" He laughed some more and that allowed him to ignore Wendy's less than pleased stare from hearing him talk. "I tell you, that story where he got his eye taken out and no one cared enough about him to help him made me laugh for days!" He would have gone on with more "funny" Butters stories if Wendy hadn't grabbed his tie.  
  
"If we're gonna work together, I think we'd get along better if you didn't talk that way about him or my other friends again." Of course Wendy didn't plan to work with these people for very long at all, but a threat like that would probably be enough to stop this line of talking. Unfortunatly she hadn't grabbed Grandpa Marsh's tie, so he was able to go on for the guy. "Geez, what's up your young butt, Billy's girlfriend? With that kind of talk and all those stories with you helping this kid, it's like you have a bonor for the pansy!"  
  
"You know Stan's the love of my life, so don't insult me like that either! Butters is a friend of mine and I just took him away from his family and all his other friends forever to get in this club! He's having a hard time right now and it's not just because he's a so called pansy, so you guys just back the HELL OFF!" That sure shut them up, even though Wendy was a little surprised that she raised her voice that much at the end. But she had just killed Butters and he was willing to help her with everything she had to do in the next few things, so the least she owed him was to make sure these guys didn't talk shit about him. Nonetheless, it did work as the soul takers got back to talking about the party and left the topic of Butters closed, so all was well that ended well in Wendy's mind.  
  
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Speaking of Butters, he was having quite an afternoon talking to Wendy's first murder victim, Miss Ellen Widmark. After he had given her the spare change she wanted, she told him that after being shot into the sun, she had a very hard time adjusting to life among the dead. By the time Wendy was put on trial for her murder about a year later however, she had gotten herself into a good home. But after hearing that the war over Wendy's imprisonment ended with her father, Francis Widmark, killing people and then killing herself, she threw herself back into a hell of a depression. Once she got out of it, she had become one of the rare poor people in Heaven, and by then she was in too much debt to get out of it. Now 8 years later, she had still barely improved her position in Heaven since she had fallen so far in the past. Butters was naturally caught up in this story of how the teacher all the boys in class wanted to date had fallen so low after her death, so much so that he didn't notice she'd taken an hour out of his time.  
  
"So, uh, it's really been Hell for you in Heaven, eh?" Butters asked since he really couldn't think of anything better to say other than the obvious.  
  
"Well, first I got shot into the sun for doing something I didn't do. Then I find out my father wanted to make amends with me the day before I died, then I find out he caught the girl who did this to me a year later, then he kills himself and 4 other people to keep her locked up. And to top it all off, I had looked forward to him joining me in Heaven so we could catch up then, but since he killed himself he got stuck in Purgatory. Finally, this unnamed fearsome dictator sends him to Hell for good measure. So all in all, it's a little bit of Hell for me, yeah." replied the formally very beautiful ex-teacher. "Now it's a matter of living with the impossible debt I set up for myself when I wasn't paying attention."  
  
"Jesus, that's, that's horrible."  
  
"I wouldn't credit Jesus for much either, I didn't get much of a handout from him when he visited the bums in Heaven." Miss Ellen coughed for a while, since even though you couldn't really get sick or ill in Heaven for long, you could still feel a little uneasy from a lack of eating. "I've had a hell of a ride. But it's nothing compared to what you must be going through. After all, Wendy chose you to die just so she could use you to find Stan again."  
  
"Well, I've already come to terms about how tough my life has- hey, hold on a minute!" Butters stopped abruptly since he had just now realized that Ms Ellen knew about Wendy's plan. "How'd you know about Wendy's plan?!"  
  
"When you search for leftover food in the back of her house, you overhear a few things. Her speaking out loud to herself about her plans was one of them."  
  
"Oh jeez, this is bad in some way but I don't know what yet." But it didn't take that long for Butters to pinpoint what the big risk was. "Oh right, now I know! You'd probably tell some people about her plan so she can't get back together with Stan! Cause if you can't have Stan as a boy toy, no one can, right?!" Miss Ellen, despite having a hourse and ugly sounding laugh now, had to laugh at Butters's stupid theory.  
  
"Are you kidding?! The whole reason my death wasn't fair was because I was never after Stan in the first place! Besides, I have no plans to turn evil and foil her little plan, something bad always happens when a member of my family goes against her anyway." This made Butters momentarily relieved until Miss Ellen put him back on the hot seat with her next question. "But you seem to be a reasonable guy who doesn't deserve to be screwed over by this. So why do you trust Wendy to bring you back to life for your trouble?"  
  
"She said she'd put me back after she found Stan again, why wouldn't she keep her word?"  
  
"A few minutes before the Iraqis took me away to die, she told me she wanted to be friends and she wished me and Stan all the happiness in the world. That was one hell of a lie. I fell for it and it cost me, why should you suffer the same fate of suffering from her lies? Do you honestly think she gives a damm about you enough to care more about your happiness than her finding Stan again? And do you really think she wouldn't dare to screw you over if she had to?"  
  
The conversation was getting more than a little uncomfortable for Butters, so he tried to take measures to end it. "Look, Miss Ellen, if you're gonna tell me she's too evil to be trusted, I won't hear it. Me and the guys have heard all the nasty things said about her for the last 10 years, and she's always proved them wrong. If you knew about your father's war with Wendy, then you should know how much Wendy's changed since you died as well."  
  
"My father was a great man. He protected our country with the best of them. And yet after two months of dealing with her and you people, he got turned into a killer. Face it, when it comes to her desire to be with Stan, she doesn't care who she ruins as a result. She ruined me and sent me to this hell, and she helped ruin my dad who used to be the perfect cop. You think it won't be easy for her to ruin you?"  
  
"Hey now, it's not like your dad was perfect before we ruined him! We heard about how he kicked you out for being gay, that's why you were in South Park to begin with! So don't rewrite history all of a sudden just to turn me against Wendy, cause, well, that ain't gonna happen!" The last part of his argument didn't really sound that eloquent or gramatically correct, but Butters was a bit too caught up in the debate by now to mind as much. Since this was obviously gonna go nowhere, he figured he really should get going and explore the rest of Heaven before he had to head back. But Miss Ellen tried to get in the final word first.  
  
"Keep this in mind. She got rid of me to be with Stan when she was 8 years old. You think she wouldn't be more dangerous 10 years later? And remember, the only possible way this kind of thing can end is if she has to make a choice. If the choice comes between her getting back together with Stan or saving you from some such thing, do you honestly think she won't choose to be with Stan? I'm not getting in the way, but I do know that's the only way this could ever end, with her deciding who's happiness is more important to her, yours or Stan's. I just hope you're not too disappointed when she chooses Stan and leaves you to rot here. You shouldn't have to be ruined and destitute here because of how she fucked you over, just like she did to me. Remember that, okay?"  
  
Miss Ellen coughed a few more times and headed back to her cardboard box home next to one of the buildings. Butters took this chance to get away while he could before she almost made him worry some more.  
  
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He actually shrugged off Miss Ellen's horrible predictions faster than he expected. True, it might be logical to expect the kind of ending she laid out for him, but he decided if he thought about that and trying to avoid a situation like that, the plan would get fucked up so fast it wouldn't even be funny- because this was already so serious. This was not one of those times where it was safe for Butters to look on the worst case senario of this plot, cause if he did, it might wind up dooming Stan and ruining Wendy's dream forever, since he figured she would only get one shot at this thing. And after knowing Wendy for 10 years, Butters knew Miss Ellen was dead wrong about her, so why dwell on that any longer than he had to? True, she would do about anything to get Stan back, but that was why he needed to help her out, since without his support, this wouldn't work at all. So why the hell would she need to screw him over?  
  
With those thoughts relaxing his brain, Butters spent the next two hours enjoying his tour of Heaven. He used the money he had left over to buy a few nice shirts for tonight and the next few days in case he needed it. He wandered around, made his comparisions between Heaven and South Park, wished that South Park would look this nice by the time he died for real, and then headed back to Wendy's house as scheduled.  
  
Wendy was already there by the time he got back, so he just told her he had fun wandering around the place. There really wasn't any need to tell her about the Miss Ellen situation- but perhaps it would have been useless since she said she already figured she would meet up with him. "You know that Miss Ellen is here?" asked a surprised Butters. "Yeah, I see her when I'm walking around town, but I haven't talked to her. I do my best to avoid her since I have too much on my mind to get in a fight with her. Maybe when I bring Stan back I can be brave enough to face her again, but not now."  
  
So both of them put that aside soon after and got ready for the party. It started at 6:30 so Wendy figured they should be out of the house at 6:10. With the Heaven's Time watch Butters had bought earlier today, he was able to put on one of the shirts he bought with enough time to spare. He didn't need to be dressed up for the occasion since he was the mere victim, but since Wendy was the guest of honor she needed some time to fix herself up. So Butters waited patiently in the living room, but made sure not to get too comfy since they'd be leaving the minute Wendy came down.  
  
About a second after he swore not to get comfy, he saw Wendy coming down and quickly got himself up. She was wearing a beautiful light pink dress which she was able to afford with her first paycheck from the soul takers group earlier today. She walked up to Butters with a smile, and he paused for some time since he needed to think of the best way to greet her. This was almost like they were heading out on a date, though this was purely for the business of finding magic spells under a group of dead people's noses. But he just settled on saying the simplest and most truthful way to greet her. "You, um, you look great, Wendy."  
  
"Thanks, I knew asking for an early paycheck today would pay off." She headed for the door and Butters followed her. "Let's go over the plan. We're gonna get in there, mingle with the group and let them talk about me, then after I'm officially made a member we sneak away to their room of spells, find the Purgatory spells, and leave. Then we'll go home to decode the spells and find the one that'll take us to Purgatory. Until then we're just gonna talk and mingle with the people like we're on a regular outing. Okay?"  
  
"Sure, mingle, I can do that a bit." Butters wasn't that good at mingling with people he knew, so it would be harder to do that with dead people. But it was his responsibility to do that and make sure no one else was wise to the plan, so he swore to do the best he could. Wendy then opened the door and asked plesently, "Shall we?" and held her arm out. Butters vaguely remembered this type of gesture from his time with Julia, so he akwardly hooked his right arm around Wendy's arm. The two shared a small laugh and then walked arm in arm out of the house and to the soul takers party, where the first step to freeing Stan from whatever he was suffering from....and from whoever was letting him suffer, was about to begin. 


	8. Act 2, Scene 3: Purgatory

Author's note: There is a scene in this chapter that comes close to an R rating, and may disturb some of you or not leave the chapter on a high note to you- I'm not sure if that will be the case, but I want to cover my basis and make sure what happens near the end of this part does not make you too disturbed or upset.  
  
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There are three realms in the afterlife that everybody knows about: Heaven, Hell, and Purgatory. Heaven? Countless movies, stories, tales, and fanfictions have been told about life in Heaven, including this one. Hell? Hell's been glorified by a number of satanists and action movies, and the town of South Park has been visited at least twice by Satan himself. The whole world knows all about the places and players that reside in Heaven and Hell- but as for Purgatory? You'd be hard pressed to find anything about that place which isn't from the Bible. All you'll hear about Purgatory is that it's where people who kill themselves go to rot for eternity, so what else is there to tell?  
  
Purgatory certainly wasn't a fun place to look at, that was for sure. In fact, there really wasn't anything in it at all. It was a wide barren black wasteland without a house or plants or any attractive scenery or skylight- the entire skyline was completly black 24 hours a day. The ground itself was made with lava right beneath it, and if anyone broke the ground lava would be shown and someone could easily throw another person into it. It wouldn't kill him or her since you can't die in the after life, but being stuck in lava for a few days would really be a major agonizing pain. Many bodies had been put into lava and had stayed there after the ground was covered up again, and they were never seen again despite the occasional noises heard underground. But since Purgatory was just a dark, desolate place filled with suicidal souls, no one really came up to control this rabble and their activities involving lava or other such things. Until about several years ago, but we'll get to that later.  
  
The souls in Purgatory survived with the occasional food and drink given to them by Jesus in his bi-monthly visits to the poor. But since their dictator came along, now they could only get sustinance and the energy to do anything with his permission and "generosity" They had it hard enough without any leaders or dictators, but now their hard living had just gotten ridiculous. All they did was lie around in the vast void of the land, sleep on the ground with lava below it- but the only difference with this dictator around was that they occasionally had to be slaves and put together the only building in the whole land- a giant mountain top that overlooked everything, provided the only light in the whole area, and let the dictator see everything that was going on. At this point in the day[although with the dark sky and dark everything, there was no sense of time in Purgatory, unlike in Heaven], the slave work was done for the day and the people were about to receive their meal for the day.  
  
Actually, it wasn't much of a meal. It consisted of the souls of Purgatory surrounding the tall but slightly thin mountain top where the dictator lived. Then the dictator would throw various scraps of food to the ground and the people would fight each other to get them. Occasionally the fights would get so heated that they tried to crack the ground open and throw their opponents into lava, and those were the dictator's favorite type of fights. But no one could see him as he was on the highest floor of the mountain, and looking down at them through the highest window that no one could see through. With that, the window opened and the unseen dictator's scraps of food were thrown out, then they landed on the ground.  
  
The fights for these small pickings bordered on the epic, and this was no exception. When the dust settled and the mass fighting ended, the ground wasn't cracked open and lava was not needed. Only about 10-20 souls out of the thousands of people in Purgatory were able to get food. There normally would have been millions of people there, but a lot of people were useless to the dictator since they couldn't work, therefore he had them put into Hell with Satan's blessing- as if Satan had a choice in the matter.  
  
One of those souls that got food knew the stories of why Satan didn't have a choice. He knew why this dictator was allowed to do whatever he wanted without God or Satan getting in his way.  
  
He knew why Saddam Hussain could run things this way- but Stan Marsh was, as usual, too overcome with thinking about what Wendy was up to right now to care.  
  
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Stan only remembered that people who kill themselves don't go to Heaven about a second before he died. Because he had forgotten that until a second before it was too late, he had spent the last 4 months paying for his mistake in the worst imaginable way. All his life was good for now was to hang around with the other suicide cases of the world, often get chosen to be one of Saddam's slaves for the day, and think about what Wendy was doing now. At the time he was finishing the two or three pieces of food that he fought 20 people to get, he figured Wendy was in Heaven and having too much fun with the dead intellectuals of the world to remember him.  
  
He rarely talked to anyone and no one talked to him. Luckly a few people who had killed themselves in the last 3 months had heard of Stan and why he did what he did, so they left him be. Which was more than could be said for the dictator himself, Saddam. He knew all too well about Stan's special relationship with Wendy and how it ended and how Stan pathetically tried to get it back. He also knew all about Stan being one of the bravest kids in South Park and how much trouble those kids were, so he couldn't very well let him have high spirits and think he didn't have to do what Saddam said. Therefore, Stan usually got the toughest work on certain days, just to be safe.  
  
As Stan finished his small "dinner", he heard to hear a familar sound. A familar marching sound. The two and fro march of Saddam's new Imperial Army. Those who Saddam deemed worthy enough to not be mere slaves were made into his special army that did his meanial jobs for him. Two perfect long rows of trained and almost brainwashed Saddam loyalists were marching to the entrance of his mountain top home. They had been asked to travel to Hell and aquire some special resources, and judging from the fact that they were carrying accesories with them, the outing seemed to be successful. The door to the mountain opened and the two rows marched in with perfect timing and precision. Once they were all in the door was closed- but everyone could clearly hear the outraged voice of Saddam Hussain a minute later.  
  
"Did you think I was just fucking with you?!! Did you think I was playing a late April Fools joke when I told you to get my old dildos?! Do you fucking think you can get away with not doing your job and only get a fucking slap on the wrist?!"  
  
Before the poor soul being yelled at could respond, the door was opened and this person was thrown out of the mountain. One of Saddam's other loyalists then came out and grabbed him so he couldn't escape when he came out. As was required, the rest of the people, Stan included[though he still minded doing this]bowed down when their self elected dictator, Saddam Hussain, came out to give his punishment.  
  
Saddam, as always, wore his gray Iraqi clothes and still had the beard he had grown ever since he was sent here. Every soul on Earth, Heaven, Hell, and in Purgatory knew who he was and either feared him, mocked him, or both. He was perhaps the most infamous being who ever lived, since at least Hitler knew his place and didn't mess with God or Satan like Saddam had done when he died. The affair between Satan and Saddam that ended with the near conquest of Earth was legendary and known to everyone, and it made people sick when they heard the full story of what Saddam liked to do with his "little creampuff" But then he was sent to live with Mormons and God forever to really make him pay- yet after a while, he had done the impossible and defeated the Mormons and their wholesome goodness.   
  
After that, it wasn't hard for him to drive God so crazy and keep him so busy that God wanted nothing more to do with him either. But since Satan didn't want him back, the two agreed that he would be stuck in Purgatory forever and allowed to do whatever he wanted- and he literally was allowed to do anything without God or Satan's objection, because none of them ever wanted to get in his way or see him again. It gave Saddam unlimited power in Purgatory which he had used for the last 5 years, and he could ask God and Satan for any favor he wanted just by threatening to come back and live with either of them again- they had never refused him when he made that threat. But now that one of his flunkies did not do his job during his latest extortion from Satan, he was mad enough to give him a really hot punishment.  
  
Saddam took a pitchfork Satan was forced to give him 2 years ago and stuck it into the ground. With all his strength, he used the fork to take a chunk of the ground off, revealing a pool of lava in it's place. He only needed to nod his head for his competant follower to lift the failure up and throw him into the lava. Before he could swim back up, Saddam put the fork back down and covered the hole with the chunk of ground still stuck on it. He then took out some super strong glue and glued the ground back together, so that when he took the fork out, the ground did not move and stayed in place like it had never been taken out at all. The poor man was now stuck below and inside the lava forever, and death could never ever relieve the hideous pain of being burned alive, like it didn't for the 150 other people Saddam had put down there over the years. Once he saw that everyone saw this demonstration of his power, he was satisfied and prepared to go back in- until he noticed Stan watching him. Remembering that it was his time to have Stan "visit" him, he had his loyal follower grab him and take him inside the mountain for a "chat".  
  
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"Hey Stanny baby, how goes old tricks?" Saddam asked once Stan was taking into his living room on the first floor. Thanks to his extortion of God and Satan over the years, he had enough materials to put together a very fancy living room with couches and a fireplace and lightbulbs. "I saw how you fought those other animals out there today, you're getting to be quite impressive during dinner time!"  
  
"Is that really what you wanted to talk to me about?" Stan said with a little carelessness, which he swore to limit from then on. Saddam had always been evil, but before he came here he was funny as well, almost like a comic relief villain with all his gay jokes and suggestions to relax. But since he came here he was less comical and was more evil, so without that much of a sense of humor, he was not someone to tick off here. Stan hoped his off the cuff remark wouldn't tick him off, and it didn't look like it had. He just said, "Just wanted to see how you were doing, how you're getting along with the others, seeing how much you miss a certain bitch girl, the usual stuff." Now Stan was the one that was about to be, well, a little more than ticked.  
  
"I told you to stop calling her a-" Saddam knew what he was gonna say, but he was in no mood to hear it, so he karate chopped him in the Adam's Apple to shut him up. Stan coughed very violently as Saddam started talking. "Guy, I rule Purgatory, and technically since I have God and Satan's balls in a blender, I rule the whole afterlife. I can do anything and say anything and no one can stop me. So don't tell ME TO STOP SAYING ANYTHING!!!" That last yell effectively proved how much more evil Saddam was than comical, so he backed away with satisfaction. Stan continued to cough though, so Saddam decided to get a few more words in.  
  
"You know, with one call to Satan I can get Widmark out of Heaven and let him gloat about how you'll never see the bi- I mean, Wendy again. You wanna go on insulting me and give me an excuse to do that, cause I will be happy to do it!" Stan finished coughing and shook his head no. "All right then, now maybe we can have a nice talk." Saddam had his guard take Stan to the couch and they let him lie down and rub his throat as Saddam sat next to him to talk.  
  
"You know what gives me a good laugh? That file on you that I made God give me when you first got here. It says that if you hadn't killed yourself, you would have been to Heaven in about 5 years after drinking too much on the 5'th anniversary of your girl's death." Saddam laughed since all twisted looneys find tragedy like that funny. "I'm sorry, it's just really funny! All you needed to do was survive 5 years and you would have been with her for all eternity, but you were so fucking impatient that you just had to go now! And look where you are as a result, stuck here forever with no way out! Ain't that a bitch?" Saddam kept laughing before he rubbed it in some more. "I mean, you must have know Widmark was stuck in Purgatory after he killed himself, if you had just remembered that earlier then you could have avoided this! That's why this is so great, because this is all your own frigging fault! And I thought evil things I did were funny, but this is priceless!"  
  
"I'd say I already knew that, but that wouldn't make a difference to you, would it?" asked Stan horsely.  
  
"Nope, I haven't even gotten to how your parents moved away and how depressed your boyfriend's been since!" Since Saddam liked to make jokes inferring that Stan was really gay and he wanted to screw his friends, Stan figured out that he was talking about Kyle. "But you knew that was gonna happen and you didn't care. All you wanted was to be with your girl again. Ha! This is why I like doing guys, they don't make you nuts enough to die for you, they just want a quick screw!"  
  
Stan was in no mood to debate screwing with Saddam, so he kept quiet and waited for him to think of something else to say since he had no choice. "Stan, I sure hope you see how dumb you were to even be with a girl in the first place. You wasted half your life being around her, and now you're stuck here and you'll never see her again. You have to admit you'd be better off never knowing her at all." Logically Saddam was sort of correct, but Stan hadn't been through so much torture that he was gonna believe him.  
  
"I know it's hard for you to understand, but I like that I was in love with a girl. I spent so many years with her because I wanted to. Because I liked to. I killed myself because I thought I could have that back, and I was wrong. That doesn't mean I wish that half of my life didn't exist because I made a mistake."  
  
"Yet here you are, the cliched victim who can't fight back and is basically a helpless little bitch for the rest of time!" Saddam them inched closer to Stan and Stan quickly noticed which parts of his body Saddam was looking at. "And since these muscles are getting a little bigger every day, I have to wonder how good of a bitch you are. I mean you only had sex on Earth once, it looks like it was a waste of talent."  
  
"Now there really isn't a way you'll make me trash that moment. True, it's a fucking bitch I only got to do it with her once, but at least I did it and I can remember it when things get really bad! You can't force that outta me!" Stan replied with a bit of anger. "And if you tried to cut off my penis to make me stop masterbating to those memories when I have free time, it'd just grow back a second later!"  
  
"Why else do you think I haven't done it yet?!" Now Saddam was getting a little miffed since Stan was starting to match his comments. "But what good are those memories now since you know you can't make new ones again!"  
  
"They're better than thinking about what I do here. You're right, I can't do anything like that again and I'm stuck thinking about my horrible fate 23 hours a day! But for at least an hour, I can remember the good old days and try to relieve them in my head without thinking about the bad stuff. It isn't nearly enough, but it keeps me sane."  
  
"Well, I don't think it's healthy to be sane everyday, we need a balance here! Now how do we acheive that?" Saddam already had an idea, but he faked humming and thinking about it just to be funny, which he wasn't. Finally he lifted his head up in a flash. "Ah ha, I've got it! You need to keep busy with a very physical activity!" This time Saddam actually grabbed Stan's arm and rubbed it a bit. "I could help with that if you want." Stan wasted absolutly no time pulling his arm away. "Never, asshole. I only did it one time with the most wonderful girl in the world, and now that I can't do that with her again, it's gonna be the only time."  
  
"Wow, you really are a stupid son of a bitch!" laughed Saddam louder than ever. "Fine, I'll lay my hands off you, guy. I can't promise that they will though." He signaled his guards to take Stan off the couch. "Put him in the special room and give me time to get one of the girls ready!"  
  
======================================================  
  
A short time later, Stan was thrown into an empty room with grey walls that looked more like a prison cell than a room. There was a small camera on the wall that was watching Stan, and obviously Saddam was using that to watch Stan's activities from wherever he was. Stan was puzzled as to what he was doing here since there weren't even any torture weapons around....that he knew of. And he really wondered why Saddam mentioned girls since what would Saddam want to do with them? Well, he had pretty much no choice but to sit there and wait to get an answer.  
  
Right then the door opened and a middle aged women came in, then closed the door quickly before Stan could think of escaping. The woman walked right up to Stan and examined him, which was easy to do since Stan just sat there and didn't have the slightest clue what this was for.  
  
"Ooh, Saddam wasn't lying about those muscles, was he?" She squealed in excitement at the first one's comment. And to back up his claim, Saddam himself spoke out of nowhere. "Well lady, you now know my stories about him weren't lies, so get to it! You might as well start the action now!"  
  
"Saddam? What the hell is this for?" Stan asked. But he didn't have time to sit while he waited for an answer, as this strange woman started to touch him some more, which made him have to back away. Meanwhile, Saddam was watching the feed from his camera in his comfy control room, and once again spoke through his intercom to clear up what was going to happen to Stan. "I know no man can survive without sex forever, so I figure since you don't wanna find a new girl, getting forced into having sex with some girl who does whatever I say is the next best thing!"  
  
"WHAT?!!" Now Stan ran for the door to get himself outta here, but it was pretty hard to do since the door was locked. "You, you can't do this to me! I told you I was only gonna do it that one time!"  
  
"Yeah, but I gotta jerk off to something before I go to sleep, and those magazines from Satan really aren't hot this month! Might as well settle for seeing your member get plugged up by some female that isn't your lover! It's evil and sexual fun at it's best!"   
  
Stan banged on the door in even more desperation before the Saddam controlled woman grabbed him. She pinned him down to the floor so he couldn't escape as they she to rip his shirt off. Now it looked like there was no way that the only girl Stan would ever have sex with would be Wendy- one last final indignity as a nail on the coffin of their relationship. This time Saddam was to blame, and Stan let him know it. "Let me outta here!! I'll kill you, you fucking Iraqi fuck, I'll take your eyeballs out and make you eat them for doing this to me!!"  
  
"First of all, you can't kill me, dickweed! Second, my eyeballs would just grown back after eating them anyway. Third, I might wanna watch out for Wanda, she tends to bite people's special areas when she really gets into it. Have a nice time doing it with another woman for at least 2 straight hours, creampuff!"  
  
Saddam laughed himself silly as he watched the action with growing excitement, while Stan couldn't even say a word as the woman jammed her tounge down her throat, pinned his arms down so he couldn't get away, and then started doing....things to his privates that Stan never wanted another girl to do again. But now in the next two hours, a woman other than Wendy wasn't going to leave that area alone at all.  
  
======================================================  
  
When the carnage ended, Saddam had Stan taken away and had his followers replace his torn clothes with one of Saddam's short shirts and short pants. He was then literally thrown out of the hideout and he landed flat on his stomach. He didn't have any possible strength left to get himself up and the other residents around him were trying to sleep on the ground, so Stan just lay there without moving a muscle.  
  
Now everything had been taken away from him. His girl, his life, his dignity, his friends, his ability to have fun, his health, and now his promise to never have intercourse with someone other than Wendy again was gone- though it really wasn't his choice to have that happen, but it still technically counted anyway. Besides, Saddam would probably do something to make him willingly want sex with other girls the next time, since he was psychotic enough to wanna see a next time.  
  
Life was so good the day before the accident. He had everything and it got taken away, then he took away the rest of it by killing himself before he realized his plan could not work. This was even worse than Wendy's death because Wendy never had a choice in the matter. It was Stan's choice to do this before thinking things through, and he was all too aware of the consequences now[unless Saddam made up a few details]Kyle was depressed, his parents and Ms Testaburger had moved away, a rumor had been going around that Butters had died yesterday, and all of South Park really missed him, even Cartman. He had caused nothing but sadness and regret to those closest to him on Earth, and his own reward for his actions was even more sadness and regret with slavery, horrible living conditions, and now that recent....encounter to go along with it. Stan had usually been the bravest and one of the smartest people in town, but he had no way outta the horrors he had created for everyone. All he was now was a cliched, helpless victim of his own actions and incompetance. It wasn't like him to be like this, but that's what he made himself out to be.  
  
All he had was an eternity to remember what he had done to himself and everyone, and some serious pain to his genitals. He tried the best he could to stop himself from adding a crying spree to the whole thing, but he still wound up crying a few spare tears throughout the night anyway.   
  
All he had was those tears and his thoughts about what Wendy was doing right now.  
  
Act II, Scenes 4-5 and Act III, Scene 1 coming July 24'th. 


	9. Act 2, Scene 4: Party Time

Meanwhile, the stars were all out in Heaven- and some of the dead famous people had come to visit the Soul Takers group too. Since Wendy was a fairly famous person on Earth, her becoming a soul taker was fairly big news and reason enough for many people to come to her initation party- just as Grandpa Marsh wanted. Some of the younger girls in Heaven would likely be interested in killing the living more if Wendy was doing it, at least that was the group's plan. But of course, none of them knew that they were being manipulated and tricked by Wendy herself, and it was gonna stay that way or else the plan was sure to fail.   
  
Most of the guests and the other soul takers were already inside the ballroom ready to start the party. But just then they heard some commotion outside, which either meant Miss Ellen or one of her hobo friends were trying to get in uninvited, or that the guest of honor had shown up. Grandpa Marsh used his still limited depth perception to look out and see that indeed, Wendy was coming into the ballroom with her victim right next to her.  
  
"Here she is, the girl of the hour and our newest member! Arriving with her first and definatly not last kill, Wendy Testaburger!" Marvin raised his hand and clapped to get his fellow members to cheer and whoop it up as well as Wendy and Butters came in. Wendy greeted Grandpa and the rest of them, knowing that she had to put up with them until she was officially sworn in, then she could sneak away and look for the Purgatory spells.  
  
Before that ceremony was to start, the group and their guests were served a light dinner, with violins playing in the background to make things look fancy. Even people who kill the living for a living can show some culture once in a while apperantly. Butters and Wendy sat with Grandpa Marsh and his group of first class workers as they ate to pass the time. Since Wendy had told them not to make any jokes or snide remarks about Butters and his "death", the group didn't really have a lot to talk about and Butters was actually starting to get bored. So he figured that maybe he could bring up a conversation, one that would give him some clues on what to expect later.  
  
"So, um, Wendy tells me there's a real scary guy running Purgatory, how about that, huh?" Wendy felt a little uneasy about taking credit for that since, in her research of Purgatory, she knew how uneasy people were when the subject was brought up. But Butters thought that if he brought it up, he might learn something about this dictator and how scary it would be to face him during their upcoming rescue mission. Yet all Grandpa would say is, "What a dumb thing to bring up! This is a night to be happy and to look forward to killing people! If we started talking about some unknown prick who has God and Satan's balls in a blender, who can do anything he wants without anyone stopping him, and who must obviously be the most dangerous being who ever lived to have God and Satan scared of facing him, then it'd bring down the whole mood! Do you really want that to be your revenge for dying here, little foo foo boy?" Since Grandpa already said enough scary things to answer his questions, Butters said "No, that's okay, sir." and then promptly shut up.   
  
"Wait a minute, sir, isn't your nephew in Purgatory right now?" asked one of Grandpa's other workers. "Yeah, that Stan Marsh guy, he killed himself because of our new member's death and he's probably being tortured by Mr unknown right now! No wonder you don't wanna think about that, um, sir."  
  
"Who, Billy? That little so and so didn't give a shit about me when I wanted to die, why should I care what happens to him now? He's a frigging hypocrite if you ask me, he refused to assist me in suicide for over a decade, and how does he die? A frigging suicide! Billy deserves whatever he gets from the dictator for letting me suffer and then killing himself anyway!" Grandpa would have gone one with his anti- Billy rant until Wendy said with a lot of self control, "You're right, the moods really a downer right now. Why don't we just finish our dinner and then we can get to the happy stuff quicker?" This seemed to silence the bitter old man, so he stayed quick just in the nick of time before Wendy thought of forcibly shutting him up about Stan.  
  
Finally the uncomfortable silence of dinner ended and the actual initation ceremony was about to begin. To save time, Grandpa Marsh was carryed over to the podium despite his objections, and after he swore to demote their job standing tomorrow morning, he began the show. "Ladies and gentlemen, we've made a hell of a club to take the future residents of Heaven away from their loved ones for the next 50 years. And tonight, we welcome a promising new member to our delightful club. Now I would like to invite Wendy Testaburger to come up here and recite the club oath!" Wendy got up and walked to the podium as everyone cheered her. She stood in front of her boyfriend's grandfather and was actually relaxed for the last time tonight, since she just had to repeat what she heard from the old man.  
  
"Repeat after me. I swear to carry out any assignments Mr Marsh gives me, not ask questions about how right or wrong it is to take possibly innocent souls away, prepare to be as harsh as possible in the roughest cases, and did I mention we don't want any moral or ethical dillemas about the kiling part?" Wendy repeated the slogan word for word, even the snide question at the end. With that, Grandpa Marsh took out a key from his pocket. "With this key, you now have access to every room in this place, as well as your group membership number to identify you. Congratulations Wendy, a.k.a number 714!" The crowd clapped again as the 1 minute long ceremony that they were having a 3 hour long party for was finished, and the new member bowed to Grandpa with a smile- mostly since now she had the key that would give her access to all their spells, but the foolish old man still did not know that part.  
  
Wendy planned for her and Butters to mingle some more after the ceremony, then after enough time had gone by, they would sneak away from the crowd and go up to the fourth floor unnoticed. Then they would use her new key to open the door to their room full of spells, and hopefully it wouldn't take long to find the old Purgatory spells there. Well, after about 20 minutes, Wendy figured it was safe to find out.  
  
======================================================  
  
"I don't get it. If these Purgatory spells were banned, why would this group still keep them in their spell room?" asked Butters a minute after he and Wendy left the ballroom and started going up the stairs to the fourth floor.  
  
"Well, Grandpa made such an effort to collect all the transportation spells when he started the group. I guess by the time he got the place up and running and God told him he couldn't use Purgatory spells, he was too busy to put them away. Or too old or something else, I don't really care right now as long as they're there."  
  
Once they got to the fourth floor, they made sure no one was in the hallways before they headed on- but since the party was downstairs and they just started to serve beer, why would they come up here? Feeling safe, Wendy and Butters walked down the hall until they came to the big door in the middle. Since the Spell Room had a lot of spells in them for the purpose of transporting souls and making sure they were put into submission for their trip to Heaven, they had a lot of searching to do to find what they wanted. So Wendy wasted no time using her new key to get inside and close the door quietly behind her and Butters.  
  
The room was basically one big library with nothing but shelves of books against the round walls. "Wow. Look at all these books. I can't believe you need so many spells just to get souls to Heaven, you only needed to use one to get me here! Why do they need so many anyway, it doesn't make that much sense when you think about it. All it's doing is making our mission harder." Wendy merely nodded and then went towards the shelves without any comments, since this was too important a task to waste time pointing out errors in logic. All the books had labels on them pointing out which types of spells they had, so Wendy just had to look at the labels to see that the Purgatory spells weren't right in front of her. So she walked around to find the label she was looking for, and Butters joined in the search right then. It took about 10 minutes for them to realize that the book of Purgatory spells was not on any of the shelves at all.  
  
"Aw geez, there's nothing here! You told me there were spells to take us to Stan, that's how you got me to die for you! I can't have died just so I could be made a fool out of just like you!" Butters was a bit too worried to control himself from making statements like that, since after all, he did die to find Stan and now there weren't any spells here to find him after all. However, Wendy wasn't saying anything and she had the most to lose and the most reasons to freak out now, so Butters got himself to take a deep breath and wait to see what she had planned.  
  
"There must be some kind of safe or somewhere they put them it. Mr Marsh told me that those spells existed and they kept them here, he couldn't have lied about that just to get me to join and give his club popularity!" Before Wendy started to think how much sense that idea made, she noticed a note on a desk nearby the shelves. Finding it curious and looking for any possible solution that might be out there, she walked over to read the note- or rather, a memo from God.  
  
"To Marvin Marsh. Tomorrow the dictator of Purgatory is paying a visit to Heaven, and one of the things he wants is to take your Purgatory spells. He wants to use them to take souls from Heaven into Purgatory to be his new slaves, and there's really nothing I can do to get in his way. So please leave them in the special safe so I can transport them to Purgatory tomorrow. Signed, God." Now Wendy had some new hope, because if a note like that was there, then the safe it was talking about couldn't be far behind, although it seemed to be pretty well hidden from sight. She looked around until she saw something she really should have noticed before, as there was a keyhole on the left side of one of the book shelves. She ran over to put the key inside, and it was a perfect fit. Perfect enough for a small opening to appear on the side of the shelf with a book inside of it.  
  
"Hey, you think that might be our book?" Butters asked with some trepidation, since it might only look obvious that it was the Purgatory book. However, when Wendy took out the book and showed him that the label said "Purgatory Spells" his fears slipped away. "All right, now I guess we can go to get Stan right now! I'll be back on Earth just a little bit after my bedtime!"  
  
"I wish that were true. But we can't disappear now and risk someone barging in to see us using these things. We'll just leave now so no one's suspicious of us, and then work these things out when we get home." Wendy closed the secret door and locked it again, then made sure to leave the note exactly where she found it. "Now we'll just take this and be on our way with no one being the wiser." However, since there was no place to hide the book under a skin tight dress, there was no way Wendy could take this home with no one being the wiser. So there was really one other solution she could think of right now.  
  
"Butters, stuff this book halfway down your pants."  
  
======================================================  
  
After getting Butters to calm down, Wendy was able to explain her plan clearly. Butters would put the bottom half of the book down his pants, then tuck his shirt inside his pants and over the book. It would make him walk a little less gracefully, but it would keep the book out of sight and let them get away with the theft. So after Wendy made sure to turn around just in case there was a wardrobe mistake, Butters followed through with the plan and in a second, the book was concealed from view- and behind Butters's shirt and inside his pants. He took a minute to test his walking skills and decided to walk out after his walking got less awkward.  
  
When they headed back to the ballroom, several of the guests were already gone and others were already drinking, since there were no hangovers in Heaven if you got drunk- which was why God had alcohol distribution limited to special occasions, something that worked well since the major alcoholics from Earth were mostly in Hell or Purgatory. So since no one was really noticing them, Wendy and Butters just casually walked out of the room without any attention paid to them. The press was gone and Grandpa Marsh had his headlines, so he really had no need to watch over them now. Therefore, they were able to get out of the building faster than they expected, but they still couldn't feel safe enough to take out the book until they got back home. But just as they were about to start walking home, they heard an old voice calling to them.  
  
"Hey Wendy, foo foo boy!" The two turned back to see Grandpa Marsh standing outside the front door with a glass of wine in his hand. "Where are you going, we're having the best time here and the party's just getting started!" It looked pretty clear that he had a bit too much to drink already, but Wendy kinda figured he'd do that. He wanted to die for so long because he could no longer do the things he liked to do and live it up thanks to his old body, but now that age didn't matter here, he could do whatever he wanted with no consequences. So drinking a lot of wine was now one of those things he was getting used to again, and now it seemed he wanted Wendy and Butters to help out, though they really had no time to. "Sorry Grandpa, we're a little tired. We'd like to go home now."  
  
"Huh?! Wait a minute, I'm officially your boss so you can't refuse anything from me! So if I order you to party with me, you gotta do it!" Grandpa Marsh would have tipped over by now if he didn't lean on a cane with his other hand, but he kept going anyway. "You get back here and boogy with me!"  
  
"No, we seriously have to leave!" Now that Wendy had the book, she really didn't need to suck up to him or his followers anymore, so she didn't have to be that polite in telling him to back off either. But he wasn't going back inside, so Wendy sighed and walked over to get him out of the way. Butters stayed behind to see her try and aid him in walking away, but Grandpa Marsh wasn't going anywhere that easily. In fact, now he was starting to swing his cane at her to get her to back off. This pretty much signaled to Butters that he had to get in the middle of this thing before someone got hurt- though at this point he wasn't that concerned that Mr Marsh might get hurt at this point.  
  
"Hey, stop trying to hit your new worker!" Butters ran over to get between Wendy and Mr Marsh, but the old man was a bit too crabby to put up with him plesently. "Back off, pansy boy!" Though he still wasn't as active as a younger man was, Grandpa was still more active than he was when he was alive- for one thing, when he was alive he couldn't have taking his cane, used the front of it to hit Butters knee, and then kick his knee so it bent backwards, that was for sure. But he had done it now.  
  
Once Butters fell because his leg was now broken, Wendy immediatly forgot to be gentle with Grandpa because he was still old, and she literally pushed him back inside so he couldn't do any more damage. He was now on his back inside the building, and before he could call his partying workers to come over and pick him up, Wendy had already picked Butters up and dragged him along with her since he obviously couldn't walk right now.  
  
======================================================  
  
Since businesses were now closed in the area, pretty much no one was outside and so no one helped Wendy on her now very long walk home. It would have taken about 15-20 minutes to walk back normally, but now since she had to drag along Butters, it was almost 3 times as long. Plus she still had to stop a few times to make sure Butters's shirt was still tucked in and the book was still out of sight. Though no one seemed to be out right now, she couldn't afford to be take chances at a time like this- especially since the noises Butters was making because of his pain might wake up a few unwanted people.  
  
Finally at about midnight Earth time, the two were finally near Wendy's Heaven house. Butters was still making noises and sounding very much in pain, so there was still a risk he would wake up some people. Wendy put him down on the ground in front of the house and quickly opened the door, then dragged him back inside as fast as she could before more people turned on the lights in their houses to see what was going on. The people here were kind or else they wouldn't be here, but they tended to be very nosy, and Wendy sure as hell didn't need evesdroppers discovering her plans.  
  
At last the two were inside and Wendy lay Butters down on the couch to try and recover. His leg was still bent and the bottom of his leg was sticking out more than the top of his leg. It gave him just as much pain here as it would have on Earth, but the difference was that everytime someone got hurt like this in Heaven, their injuries would instantly heal on the next sunrise. But until then, a person would have to deal with the pain for the rest of the day, which was why no one wanted to get hurt very early in the morning or the whole day and night would be quite a bitch to get through.  
  
These were thoughts very prominant in Wendy's brain right now. Her original plan was to come home, work out the spells and find out which one would take her instantly to Purgatory. There were all kinds of spells in the book that related to Purgatory, but only one would get her there on the spot, and she had figured it would take a few hours to decode the spells to begin with. But now Butters injury may have messed up the plan even more. She still needed his help to find Stan when they got to Purgatory, since even though she was strong and motivated enough, it didn't seem like she could take on whoever this dictator fellow was by herself, she needed backup. But then again, Butters was never a good fighter or a fighter at all to begin with, he was beaten up by bullies who were obviously pansies compared to this dictator. Besides, his injuries would heal when the sun rose, so he would be okay in about 6 hours anyway. The main thing she needed Butters for was to kill him to get in the group, and that job was done. She could just leave him there, take the spells, go to Purgatory and bring Stan back without him, then come back to send him away to Earth again. It really wouldn't take that long, so it seemed like a plan.  
  
With a flourish, Wendy went over to Butters and lifted up his shirt a bit, then gently pulled the book out from his pants. Butters groaned in pain despite her best efforts, but groaning in pain was really all he could do or say right now. Wendy tried to ignore those thoughts and concentrate on looking through the spells. She went through the book and saw that there were about 500-1000 spells relating to Purgatory, but none were labeled. They were all in codes and only trained, licensed soul takers knew how to decode them and use them. She was relatively new at decoding spells and figuring out which ones did what, so this indeed would take a few hours to do.....and then her heart sank.  
  
Since this would take so long, she probably wouldn't be able to get to Purgatory till about 3 in the morning. And now that she was thinking clearly, it probably wasn't that realistic that she could get Stan out that fast, she knew nothing about what kind of traps or obstacles were there so anything could slow her down. Plus she would inevitably have to face this dictator, so that would eat up a lot of time. By the time she got back it would probably be well past sunrise, and by then a lot of people would have woken up.....and probably dropped by to visit Butters and see why he was moaning last night. Also, Marsh probably told his workers and the press about the fight, so that might attract some media attention to the house in the morning. Therefore, now it was logical that by the time she decoded the spells and by the time she got back with Stan, there might be people outside her house waiting to talk to her and Butters because of that stupid fight- then they would see Stan and figure out she had stolen the book! God would certainly frown on that when He heard the news and He'd probably keep Stan in Purgatory forever for it, and eliminate any chance she had of going back for him!   
  
So thanks to the risk and attention that Butters injury would bring, and thanks to them getting here so late because she had to drag Butters home....it was way too risky to do this tonight. She would decode the spells, but it would be too risky to actually use them. All she could do now was study the spells and find a private time to use them tomorrow afternoon, after she satisfied the people who might be interested in finding out what happened tonight. But a trip to Purgatory tonight was out of the question for safety, health, and security reasons.  
  
"Well Wendy, aren't you gonna go get Stan now?" Butters asked now that he could bring himself to talk again. But since he didn't have access to all those thoughts Wendy had, he didn't know that Wendy had to postpone the trip thanks in large part to his injury, but he would now. "I can't go tonight. We got home so late and people will probably come to find out what happened to you tomorrow. It's too risky to go now, so I'll just decode the spells and find out which one will take me to Purgatory. But I can't go tonight and obviously, you can't either."  
  
With a heavy sigh, Wendy put down the book and headed to the kitchen to find something to calm Butters injury, but on the way she wound up kicking the wall in frustration. And now that Butters was able to understand why her trip to reuniting with Stan was delayed, he felt like sighing heavily to go along with his leg pain as well. 


	10. Act 2, Scene 5: Quiet Time

After Wendy gave Butters an icepark for his leg and a glass of water, she sat in the kitchen to start decoding the spells. There was a system and ways of translating symbols that was needed for this, which was easy for experienced people but not so much for her. However, by the end of the first hour she had decoded a good deal of spells, although none of them were the ones to use to instantly get into Purgatory. But she was making progress, and with a little more she figured she might get done quicker than she thought. It was almost a shame that she already decided to alter her plans to go away tonight, thanks in part to Butters getting hurt. She tried not to be a little ticked off when she thought about it, so she hoped it wouldn't be that easy to find the spell she needed or else she would be. If they got home on time without any incident and found the spell quickly, they could have already been in Purgatory and she could have already found Stan by now. She had waited too long for that to be patient in waiting for one more moment, and it was her own fault for bringing Butters here to begin with! He just had to get in the way to ruin everything all because.....all because he wanted Grandpa Marsh to leave her alone and make sure he didn't hurt her. Shit. Now Wendy couldn't be that mad at him after all.  
  
Almost right on cue, Wendy heard him groan in pain for the first time in about a half hour. Even after she wanted to be mad at him, she brought herself to go back to the living room and see what was wrong. When she got there, Butters was still on the couch, sort of. His arms were on the floor so he wouldn't fall off from the couch, but Wendy quickly got him back up so he could sit down again. "Ow! Oh boy, that's what I get for trying to get more comfortable, it almost made me fall off and my leg's hurting again!"  
  
"Don't worry, once you fall asleep you'll be fine and that leg will heal by itself when you wake up." Butters felt a little better since he remembered the rules of pain that Wendy told him about earlier in the daytime, and he was relieved that his leg would look normal again at sunrise. But once he looked at Wendy again, he got nervous again, this time from guilt. "So, um, h-how are the spells going, did you find the big one yet?" Wendy attempted to be optimistic for both their sakes and mood right now. "Not yet, but I'm hoping it doesn't take more than an hour and a half. It is quite hard though, and a little tiring." Wendy started to yawn right afterwards, since that statement made her realize she was tired after carrying Butters and spending an hour decoding spells. Now she might not even be able to finish analyzing the whole book at that rate. Her disappointment showed more clearly on her face now, along with her sleepy eyes.  
  
"Wendy, I'm so sorry I screwed up everything. You probably would be seeing Stan again by now if it wasn't for me." Since Wendy was thinking that herself about a minute ago, she wasn't so sure how to answer that. But she tried to shake it off by saying, "Well, I've gone 4 months without seeing him and I'm still sane, what's one more night?"  
  
"Yeah, I guess. But you talked me into letting me kill you because you thought I could be a big help, and I didn't live up to any of that so far. Sort of like when I got picked for the fourth friend, isn't it?" the now melencoly Butters quipped with a sigh.   
  
"Not exactly, since I'm not gonna ask you to go on a talk show and be framed for prank phone calls." Wendy actually smiled at her little comment, despite the fact she was refering to painful times for Butters. "And you're hardly gonna become a Professor type super villain if I fired you, so maybe this'll turn out to be just a little different!" This time Wendy managed to laugh at her satirical comment, and now Butters was starting to get the joke. "Hey yeah, and there's no one small enough to be my new General Disarray, that would make it real different right there!" Since enough years had gone by for Butters to laugh at his Professor Chaos phase, he could now laugh about it like he was doing right now with Wendy. The laughs certainly did a good job of releasing the oppressive tension in the room, and was a nice set up for Wendy to make a serious pep talk.  
  
"Listen, I don't want you to think you ruined anything. You just suffered an unfortunate accident because you were trying to protect me from a drunk old man. I asked you to help me and have my back, so why should I hate you for trying to do that exact same thing back there? In any case, this doesn't mean we won't succeed, and it doesn't mean you did anything to ruin it." Wendy got up feeling a lot more satisfied than she was when she came in. "So you just get some sleep to rest that leg, the faster you do then the faster you'll be all better." Once Butters started to smile and relax, Wendy formed a grin and headed back to the kitchen. "I'll be right there if you need anything.", she said before she went back to reading and trying to avoid going to sleep herself.  
  
Wendy spent another half hour trying her best to decode as many spells as possible, but they were tough ones. They had to be because only the most trusted soul takers who could be counted on not to abuse this power could use these spells and decode them- yet for all this trouble, only one of them just took you to Purgatory, and she hadn't found it yet. But at the end of that half hour, the lack of sleep and the comfy chair she was sitting on were taking their toll on her, and she figured she was gonna have to get some sleep, if only because she had to be alert and on her game to solve this puzzle. She decided reluctantly to put the book in a safe place in her room, then get right back to work on it the second she woke up tomorrow. But first she had to check on Butters to make sure he didn't need anything else. The fact that he hadn't made a peep in a half hour might just be a deceptive sign that everything was fine. Yet when she went back in the living room with the book, it wasn't the case since Butters was now asleep peacefully. He even had a smile on his face as he slept, just like he would on Earth.  
  
It was real hard for Wendy not to smile at the sight. He looked so calm as if nothing had happened at all, probably one of the rare times that he was ever calm and not worried about something. That was because she knew that he had a lot to be worried about most of the time, especially in 4'th grade and in high school. But she had done her part to end his troubles in high school, otherwise he wouldn't have talked about it in the eulogy- she had gotten video Heaven survellance of the funeral to see that. In fact, his little tale was the only halfway pleasent, tear free part of that video for her. She was really on her game in those days as she made those bullies back off and stop giving him Hell. Of course she wished she didn't have to do that because it really wasn't fair that he got pushed around so much that she had to step in. Looking at Butters sleeping, it really puzzled her as to why people were so committed to hurt kids like that. Probably because people have the misfortune of living in an often sick and cruel environment that says beating up "nerds" and "Melvins" was cool and acceptable- it almost made Wendy glad she wasn't in that kind of society anymore.  
  
It was a funny thing that she thought that, since before 4'th grade and before she started to remake her image, she barely talked to Butters or even noticed him. Back then he was just another faceless Melvin to her and to most other people. Even when they became friends, they didn't hang out a lot by themselves since they each ran with their normal crowd of friends or aquaintances. Still, she spent enough time with him to know that he was funny, considerate, not like other boys who tried too hard to be macho and unfeeling sometimes, and although he was technically a bit of a nerd, who was Wendy to complain since she was so smart she might be considered a nerd too if she didn't hang out with the right people? And so what if he was a nerd and a Melvin, the same people who called him that also let Cartman be in the cool group of people, so who would want to listen to fucked up people like that? Unfortunatly, too many people did and they let Butters have it for not being cool enough as a result, and it really wasn't fair. That's why she helped him in high school and that's why she considered him as a friend, because he was too innocent and nice to deserve such cruelty. And she knew that if the opportunity called for it, he was capable of being someone who was really valuable to have around in a time of need- a real loyal friend who truely knew better about how to live life than a lot of other, more respected people did.  
  
Wendy closed her eyes and recalled one such example. When she and the others began middle school, Wendy fell into a club of cool, popular older girls who took her under their wing. She was very flattered by this, her first chance to hang out with the really trendy, popular club- since although she had become well liked by people, she wasn't someone normally considered to be part of a popular clique. She never really cared for that stuff before, but the more she thought of it, the more enticed she was to be around these type of people and have the type of respect really cool kids had. Therefore, she started acting like they did and started acting less smart and stuff- basically acting less and less like herself. Stan, Bebe, and her other old friends were confused, but Wendy didn't let them drag her into one of those arguements where she would yell at them for trying to make her unpopular again. She was confident she had finally found a group of girls she could fit into and belong to- or so she thought.   
  
As it turned out, after school one day she was called over by the group to meet them outside. Then when she got there she slipped on a pile of mud that was put there by the girls, and then they poured feathers all over her which made her sneeze for a few minutes. They got the whole thing on tape, including the aftermath where they told her they only let her near their group so they could pull this prank and videotape her sadness as their annual beginning of the year prank. Wendy would have normally killed them for such a prank, but by them she was so convinced they really liked her and wanted to make her really popular, she whined and acted sad about it like a regular girl would. Of course they only laughed at her sad feelings of betrayal since it was golden footage for their prank. By then she was so overcome that she ran away to try and stop crying, then of course the rain started to come down. By the time she calmed down, she was out of breath and she stopped running to sit down at a sidewalk in the rain, but of course she was too depressed and sad to mind the rain that much. She didn't even hear the raindrops in her head, but she did manage to hear a voice behind her a few minutes later.  
  
"Wendy? What are you doing out in the rain? And why do you look all dirty?" It was only then that she noticed she was sitting in front of Butters's house, and Butters had opened the front door a bit to call out to her. Once his mother saw that, she told Wendy to come in and dry off if she wasn't going home, and she did. Once she got herself dried off and got some of the spare mud off her coat in the bathroom, she went back downstairs and sat on the couch, not knowing what to say or do now. But then Butters sat down next to her anyway. "So, uh, you didn't exactly answer my question. Why are you- I mean, uh, why did you used to be so dirty?" So with nothing else to do, Wendy told him about how the girls treated her and how she was betrayed, and tried not to cry again as a result.   
  
"I know I really shouldn't be sad, since I was trying to get the friendship of people I normally wouldn't hang out with. But that might be the point. Sure, I had friends before, but I've never had a large group of girls, or really popular girls, to hang out with before, and it made me feel great to have that here. I got a taste of being with really popular girls, and that taste was enough to make me cry when I found out they were using me." Wendy stifuled another tear before she went on. "I was probably gonna really change myself and make myself different to fit in if it went on anymore. I really feel like I was gonna do it."  
  
"You were gonna be just like those popular girls to fit in with them?", Butters finally chimed in.  
  
"I probably was, since they obviously wouldn't have like me if I was being normal. Hell, it's because of me being a bookworm and a smart girl that they did this to begin with! So there you go!" Butters now was more than a little puzzled at the irony that he just noticed. "So....you're sad because girls who didn't like you hated you after all? And you were really willing to act like someone else to get them to like you?" Wendy nodded yes. "Um, well, can I say something if you promise not to be mad? Uh....that sounds a little stupid to me."  
  
Wendy was now the puzzled and confused one, and since Butters wanted to act fast before she got upset, he explained himself quickly. "I mean, you said you wanted to change for these girls and that's what sounds stupid to me, because you were fine the way you were before!" Wendy's facial expression stayed still after hearing that, so Butters took this room to explain himself some more. "You already had boys and girls for friends that liked you just fine before, so why would you wanna give that up to be friends with girls you didn't even know? And girls that don't even like you the way you are in the first place!"  
  
"What's that supposed to mean and how should it make me feel better?"  
  
"Well, I'm, eh, just saying you didn't have to change yourself for girls that didn't like you that much. I think you're more than okay just the way you are, and so do a lot of people. You're smart and fun and pretty and a good friend to a lot of us, so....if those girls can't see that about you, then why should you be so sad that they don't like you? You're great just the way you are and you don't need bitch friends like them to prove it! Uh, right?"  
  
"No....no I don't have to at all." Wendy said as her self confidence began to grown again.  
  
"You know Wendy, I actually envy you. You can be yourself and even if those girls hate you, a lot more people like you. I've never had that kind of luck." Butters went on as his own self confidence went down a tiny bit. "Most of the time when I act like myself, the cool kids have picked on me or made fun of me. Even now when I have a girlfriend and the respect of Stan and the rest, I still feel like I have to act tough and macho and not like myself to impress them. I still don't really feel like I can be myself for most people to really like me. But you can be yourself and make a lot of friends doing it, so, well, I kinda admire you for having that gift that I don't have. But I am happy you didn't throw it away."  
  
Somehow, that second big speech of his made Wendy feel just as relieved as the first one did. Now that logic was reentering her brain, she was starting to feel stupid as a matter of fact, since she had lots of friends and the greatest boyfriend in the world- she didn't have time to worry about being popular! She had been her free thinking, intellegent, and recently more caring self for years and people liked her or at least respected her enough not to get in her way. She had friends to have her back and no one fucked with her, and now it was time to get back into that old groove! Now she was officially better and ready to get her boyfriend and her friends back- partly so they could come up with a hell of a revenge plan on the bitches. So now it was official, Butters had singlehandly brought her back to reality. The rain stopped about 5 minutes later, so Wendy figured it was safe to go and begin her plans.  
  
Before she went though, Wendy almost kicked herself for not remembering to comment on what Butters was really saying in that second speech. So when they were both outside on the doorstep, she fixed that. "Butters, I really owe you for this one. But maybe you should take your own advice about yourself. You're right, a lot of people have been annoyed by you just being yourself, but just as many people still care about you anyway. You shouldn't be afraid to be yourself because you're terrific the way you are too, or else you wouldn't have been such a big help today." Butters started to blush in a way that made Wendy come close to blushing herself. "Well, at least I was right about you being smart, huh?", he said, and Wendy chuckled- then she remembered another thing he said earlier. "You also said I was pretty, do you think that's true?" At that point she was just having fun since she knew how she looked[Stan told her that almost every day]but it was funny to hear Butters say something like that too.  
  
"Well, sure I do. Who the heck wouldn't?" A split second later he got a little bit nervous after saying that. "But, uh, don't tell Julia I said that, she needs to think about helping you get revenge instead of being mad at me. Okay?" And to the day she died, Wendy kept her promise not to say a word to her about it.  
  
The present day dead Wendy then returned to the present and snapped out of her flashback. She looked at the sleeping Butters again and remembered once more that although the subsequent revenge against those girls was sweet, it wouldn't have been possible without his advice. That was really why she came through for him when Julia left and when he got pushed around in high school, because she knew that he was a loyal enough friend to do the same thing for her if he had to. And she knew he'd do everything in his power to be a better help to her now, so that definatly made her a lot less worried about their current situation.   
  
She could have picked someone braver and stronger like Kyle to kill and to help her, but Kyle probably would have dismissed her and not believed she was really there. He was probably too bitter and logical to be much of a help. But Butters was more eager to help and in many ways, he needed to help get her and Stan back together more than anyone else. Doing that would really help him get things back in order on Earth and he could start going on with things again- that would be a great way to send him off and to say a proper goodbye to him. That was what friends were for after all. That was why she picked a true friend to aid her in the greatest time of need she would ever face.  
  
Wendy finally got up and figured she should go to sleep while she was on this confidence high. She took one more look at Butters and lightly patted him on his tuft of hair on his head. He would feel a lot better after sunrise, and she now remembered that when push came to shove, he wouldn't let her down. He was too determined to let himself let her down. She headed upstairs to rest her mind so she could be on top of her game too. Tonight didn't go that smoothly, but there was no way her or Butters would let tomorrow suffer that same fate. They would both make sure Stan was sure as hell coming home for real this time.  
  
END OF ACT II 


	11. Act 3, Scene 1: Saddam Time

At 6 AM in Heaven, the sun was rising, injuries were healing, and a few early birds were getting up to start the day. But at 6 AM in Purgatory, it was still dark with barely any light, and the poor souls there- including Stan- really didn't want to get up....or be there in the first place, or be alive to possibly get buried in lava, etc. But Saddam Hussain was already up in his mountain palace, and he was already dialing the phone in his lavish bedroom, because he needed God to wake up to forfill his end of his latest deal. "Hello? Hello?! Ey God, pick up, you rat son of a-"  
  
"Oh geez Saddam, did you need to call me this early?"  
  
Saddam had succeeded in getting God on the line thanks to the special phone he got God to give him. God's booming voice could be heard clearly- which made him sound more intimidating than he actually looked, Saddam remembered with a hearty laugh to himself. But he shook it off since this wasn't the time to be funny, he had forced God to do a serious thing for him today. "God, I need those Purgatory spells now. I wanna get to work decoding them and using them to bring any soul I want from Heaven to work for me, so I don't wanna waste the whole day. Hand it over!"  
  
"Saddam, I really think that's going too far. I mean, we have rules here and the rules state that if a soul is meant to go to Heaven, he or she shouldn't have to live in Purgatory or Hell or another place in the afterlife. Besides, I've spent 4 months telling a young girl that she can't go to Purgatory to see her late boyfriend, so I think I'd be a little hypocritical if I let you take people there instead." Saddam really wasn't listening since he had better things to do, and he still had his little threats to make if God didn't cooperate. Hopefully God would shut up soon so he could make them. "Do you understand a little of that, Saddam?"  
  
"Yes. Yes I do, God. Now let me tell you how things work in the real world. You can send me that book of spells to bring people from Heaven here, or I can come back to Heaven and refuse to leave you alone for the rest of time. Then I'll go back to Hell and bug Satan to death until he begs you to death to do something. That's not how you wanna spend eternity, is it God? Well, if you don't want me to be around you forever and ever and ever with all my gayness and weapons building and America bashing, send me the fucking book, fuckhead!!" Since that last yell was even more proof that God didn't even want Saddam to have a reason to come back to Heaven and annoy him again, God gave in very quickly.  
  
"All right, all right, you win again!" Saddam chuckled since this was how he always got God to do whatever he wanted and that's how it would always be. "Okay Saddam, I told the head of the soul takers club to put the book in a special safe. Once I cast a spell over that safe, it should put the book right in your lap." A satisfied Saddam sat back and waited for the Purgatory spells to appear right in front of him. But when God finished chanting his little chants, the book wasn't there. God sounded confused as to why that was, then he cast his chant again- but again, the book didn't appear in Saddam's bed. "Uh, hello God? Where's my book and my reason not to attack you?"  
  
"I don't get it, Marsh said he'd put the book in that special safe, but I'm sensing that the book isn't there at all! If it was then you would have got it by now, I swear to me!" This hardly made Saddam any calmer since, after all, incompetance in the God regime had just made sure his book wouldn't get here that quick. "So if it's not in that safe, where the hell is it, smartass?!"  
  
"I don't know, okay?! I just need time to ask someone who might!"  
  
======================================================  
  
With no time wasted at all, God used His power to appear inside the soul takers building. He appeared in His usual....weird physical form that resembled some kind of platapus or some other strange animal no one could fathom. He hardly had time to worry about his appearance as He neeed to get that book to appease Saddam. He knew Grandpa Marsh was somewhere in the building, and it didn't take long for Him to prove it as God found the old man sleeping in the lobby, since he hadn't moved that much after his fight with Butters and Wendy. God wasted no time in shaking Mr Marsh until he woke up, and although he was a bit hungover, he wasn't wasted enough not to recognize the Creator.  
  
"Hey God, what's the deal? How'd the book transfer go?" God resisted the urge to get more upset than He was and simply answered, "I wouldn't know. I told you to put the book in the safe and when I used my powers to transfer it to the dictator, a funny thing happened. The book wasn't there for me to transfer!" God quickly got Grandpa Marsh up on his feet. "Go up there and find that book for yourself, or get one of your men to carry you up there or something!"  
  
After that died down, Grandpa Marsh went to the spells room and found out that, indeed, the Purgatory spells book was not in the special safe. God ordered him to order his employees that were still in the building to conduct an all out search for the book. But after turning the building upside down for an hour, no one found it, of course.   
  
"I knew removing security cameras in all these rooms would be a bad idea, Goddammit!", yelled Grandpa Marsh. Luckly God was too busy worrying to notice how He'd been cursed out, since now He had to tell Saddam his book was gone, and that he had a reason to be pissed off enough to come back here and give Him Hell. With a huge sigh, He transported His special phone to the building and called Saddam up again to tell him the book was not there.  
  
"What kind of rejects do you have following your orders, God? You should be happy I wanted to take them away to be my slaves, but that isn't happening right now, is it?!" God tried to think of how He could calm Saddam down and reassure him they would find the book and appease him- but He heard the worst possible news from Saddam before He could say anything. "I'm coming over there myself since you can't do your job. Transport me to your house in Heaven so we can solve this case together, k?"  
  
"Are you insane, we can handle this ourselves without your special kind of help!" God cursed Himself Himself this time since He already knew Saddam was insane and he wouldn't take no for an answer. A fact he proved with his answer. "Look God, I still remember the spell I need to get to Hell from here. I can go visit Satan again and bug and rape the shit out of him, and then Satan will call you and beg you to let me into Heaven so I'll leave him alone. I can get into Heaven by you letting me in, or I can bug Satan so much that he'll declare war on you and do anything I tell him to do against you just to shut me up! Either way, buddy, I'm coming over!!"  
  
With that quick convincing, God cast his spell over the phone to transport Saddam from his Purgatory mountain home to God's palace in Heaven. Then most sadly, God transported himself to His home to greet Saddam and to let him work with Him to find where the book had gone to.  
  
======================================================  
  
Back in the quiet part of town, people were just getting up and they didn't hear about the rampage going on in the club. However, among the people that were up, Wendy and Butters were not two of them. In fact they were still sleeping in Wendy's house, even though it was now 8 AM in the morning and the search for the stolen book was well under way.  
  
For Butters, although he wasn't up he was still able to toss and turn like a normal person, because his leg had indeed healed by itself. Now he was having some pretty peaceful dreams of Earth and of going back home to his family after completing his mission successfully. Then his dream went to a scene in Purgatory where things had settled down and Stan and Wendy were back together again. And after Wendy was done hugging Stan to a second death, she turned to Butters and thanked him so much for all his help. She hugged him to further show her thanks and he hugged her back. He didn't mind so much since the hug was actually quite a bit comfortable and even fun. He heard her sweet melody of a voice say softly in his ear, "Butters....Butters.....Butters!"  
  
With that the fantasy ended as Butters woke up to see the real Wendy after she had just almost yelled in his ear.  
  
"Wake up, Butters, we overslept! It's already 8 in the morning!" Butters shook off his sleepyness and his strange dream as he sat up. "Is that bad?"  
  
"More than a little since I want to get out of here as quick as possible, and it's still gonna take a while to find the spell to do it!" Wendy was more than a little upset since she had too much of a peaceful sleep and had just woken up a minute ago to see how late it was- late for her, at least. "Come on, get yourself cleaned up and then I'll try to teach some of the decoding techniques to you! Maybe this'll get done faster with two people doing the work!" Wendy headed right back up the steps to get the book and resume the work, while Butters just got up slowly, saw his leg was better, and slowly headed up the stairs himself to get ready for this big day.  
  
======================================================  
  
God's palace was not only bathed in complete light, it was located at the center of the largest town in Heaven. This was where the prototypical angels with halos and wings live, where the rich dead people hang out at, and where Jesus and the other big wigs of the place meet once in a while. This time, only God and Saddam were meeting inside to figure out how the Purgatory spells book could have disappeared from the special safe. Well, actually by now the search wasn't going so well since it was already 9 AM, so Saddam resorted to his usual tactic of placing blame.  
  
"This is all your fault, God! This whole search is theater, the real criminal is you! Why the fuck weren't you at this ceremony at the soul takers club to make sure there weren't any thieves?! Some God you are!", yelled Saddam, which gave God one more reminder as to why He wanted to keep Saddam in Purgatory.  
  
"Saddam, I had things to do and honestly, how was I supposed to know someone was gonna get the idea to steal that book?! I only know everything about what living people are gonna do, I can't forsee what the dead are up to! Besides, the guest of honor was someone I was tired of seeing anyway, I didn't want to go there and have Wendy Testaburger yell at me again!"  
  
Saddam was about ready to rip God another new one- about his 32'nd new one so far this year- but he suddenly stopped a bit when he heard God mention Wendy's name. It somehow rang a bell to Saddam as if he'd heard it before, so he turned the conversation to that topic. "Wendy Testaburger? What kind of name for a soul taker is that?" God responsed with some relief, "Well the important thing was that she actually took a job other than yelling at me! She's only been here for 4 months and she spent the last 3 of them trying to talk to me and plead for me to send her boyfriend to Heaven even though he killed himself. I think his name was Stan Marsh or something, you might know that better than me." And indeed, Saddam did.  
  
"I know about Stan, he's had a time bugging me about missing a girl named Wendy himself." God snapped His fingers after piecing that puzzle together. "Yep, that must be the guy. He wasn't supposed to wind up with you, all he had to do was wait 5 years to come here and see the girl again. But he didn't wait and somehow I'm to blame for it according to Wendy! It's hard not to be a little annoyed, even though she is just desperate to see Stan again by, in her own words, any way nessecary." And with that, Saddam was starting to put his own little puzzle together- the puzzle of what really happened last night.  
  
"So let's review. The new member of the soul takers club was Wendy Testaburger, who was all pissed off that she was stuck here while her beefcake boy toy was stuck with me. And on the night of a party in her honor, the book that contained the only spells that could transport a person from Heaven into Purgatory was stolen. And you knew this girl was desperate to see Stanley in Purgatory at that, eh?" Saddam walked up to God slowly with a blank look on his face, and then just slapped Him on His big forehead. "What the hell was that for?!"  
  
"For being dumb enough to not go to that party, for not telling me this before we wasted three hours looking for the book, for not figuring out the bitch did the crime earlier, take your pick!" God tried to wrap His head around that puzzle of an insult before it started to become clear to Him. He knew personally how determined Wendy was to get Stan back, and since He created her, He knew how nothing stopped her from getting what she wanted period, not even the laws of God. By the time He figured it out, Saddam was already making plans for a counterattack.  
  
"God, where does the bitch live, anyway?!"  
  
"She lives outside of the part of Heaven where the soul takers club is, in fact I heard she was letting the guy she killed stay there for a while. Butters was his name, I think." Saddam remembered who Butters was too after hearing Stan's constant stories about Wendy's death and Butters role in that night. "Oh yeah, the pussy boy! Then the attack should be a whole lot easier!"  
  
"What attack?"  
  
"God, send your best law enforcement men to Wendy Testaburger's house for a full on raid, or else I'll have my army sent there to totally trash the whole neighborhood." Since God really didn't want to have Saddam do that, He was gonna get to work sending some people to Wendy's house right away, though Saddam felt like he had to remind Him to get off His ass quicker.  
  
"Don't waste time, honey buns, get to sending the troops! I want my book back, and the health of that bitch thief and her pussy pal is a distant ninth concern to me."  
  
Act III, Scenes 2-5 coming July 24'th. 


	12. Act 3, Scene 2: Raid

At about 9:10 AM, Butters and Wendy were going over the Purgatory spell book and double checking the spells they had decoded, just to make sure they hadn't decoded the right one and missed it the first time. The task was not only taking it's toll on Wendy's brain, since Butters was starting to get a headache from seeing all these symbols over and over. But unlike the other spells that existed, the Purgatory spells were the only ones you could translate into English instead of Latin, so that made it a little easier. "Aw geez, we've been doing this for an hour and 10 minutes, shouldn't we have decoded the right spell by now? And how are we supposed to know which decoded spell is the right one anyway, what's it supposed to say?"  
  
"If I knew what it said, I would have said it by now to go away! Don't worry, we've gone through about half of these and we still have the translations for all the symbols, one of these has to work!" Wendy went back to looking at her piece of paper where she wrote the English translations for all the symbols on the book. She had to keep her hopes up that the next spells would translate into what she wanted, but a few more failures and that hope wouldn't look so good by now. "Let's see.....there's a symbol of a cow, that means the first word is See. The next symbol has a picture of President Kerry, so that translates to The."  
  
"Hey, I remember those next three pictures, we saw them in that spell where you send dildos to Purgatory! The next three words are Journey To Come!" Butters pointed out with growing excitement. "And those next two pictures of a Christmas tree and a dying dog are the symbols for the words To Pass!" Butters had indeed learned something in the last hour despite being overloaded with knowledge and symbol translations. He wrote down the spell so far with growing confidence, although Wendy knew they'd been down this road a few times only to be disappointed when they saw a spell for giving someone in Purgatory a burst liver, or to have someone's head explode in Purgatory, or some other disgusting spell. But she went on to look for the translation to the next few symbols anyway. And like Butters, she had seen these symbols so often during the reading that she could remember their translation right off the bat.  
  
"I think I got most of the second sentence! The next five words are The Trip Ahead Will Be!" Butters wrote down the translation on a seperate piece of paper where he wrote the first line. Then he saw the symbols of a cereal box and a vampire in the book, and figured out the next two words were "A Blast" Two of the four lines to the spell had been solved already.  
  
At 9:15, the spell was completly translated and the hopes and dreams of Wendy had gotten their biggest break ever. For the spell was:  
  
See the journey to come to pass  
  
The trip ahead will be a blast  
  
If a journey to Purgatory you seek,  
  
Just repeat these words to achieve your feat.  
  
"This is it!! This has to be it, it says so right there! We just say these words and we're right there to see my man!" Wendy almost jumped for joy at the success she had just found, but Butters had one more concern. "So that's the spell to get there, huh? Well, uh, if we go there now, how are we gonna get back when we find Stan?"  
  
"I translated that spell late last night on this piece of paper!" Somehow Wendy contained herself enough to pull out a piece of paper with this spell written on it.  
  
So now the journey is at an end  
  
You visited the place of the suicidal dead  
  
To get back to Heaven and your old home  
  
Say this to leave Purgatory and never roam.  
  
She took the piece of paper that Butters wrote the recently translated spell on and was about ready to memorize it and forfill her destiny- until she heard quite a bit of commotion outside.  
  
======================================================  
  
It had taken 30 minutes, but the special dead military that Saddam ordered God to send had arrived in the neighborhood. The noise and marching they made could be heard by everybody in the area, and since none of them knew about what God and Saddam needed those troops for, they didn't know if they should be afraid of the troops attacking them. But this army's orders about what they would do came from Saddam, who had an earphone placed in the army general's ear so he could command orders to him from God's palace.  
  
"We're at the neighborhood where the suspects live, sir." This general wasn't talking to any of his men, he was just speaking out loud so Saddam could hear him through the earpiece. Only he could now hear Saddam's orders in his ear. "Well, it's about time, genius! Okay, you have the address, go there and torch the place, but bring that book they have to me! And bring the suspects to me alive!"  
  
"Mr dictator, no one can die here, there's no way they couldn't be brought back alive", stated the general, using logic that Saddam really had no time to pay attention to. "I knew that, asshole! Will you just go destroy some stuff and maim the targets now or something?!" Since God told the troops to do whatever Saddam ordered, the general stopped bugging Saddam and ordered his men to surround the Testaburger house. About 20 seconds later the entire place and all it's exit points were indeed covered by the military, making sure the targets could not escape.  
  
Once everyone was in position, the general ordered the attack to start and he began it by charging into the front door and knocking it down. Half of his fleet followed him inside to capture the kids while the other half stayed outside to capture them if they got out of the house. The half inside the house got a different kind of surprise, however. When they got inside the kitchen, there was no one inside and the Purgatory spells book was lying on the table with no one guarding it. It appears they had accomplished their mission of retriving the book without breaking a sweat- only the front door. "Mr dictator, we have the book! We haven't found the suspects yet, but we have what you wanted and that's what counts!", shouted the general.  
  
Back in God's palace, Saddam was sitting on a chair listening to the good news. God overheard it too and was overjoyed that the book was found and Saddam could go home now and away from Him. However, Saddam had a nagging thought in his brain. Saddam was never much of a thinker, except in the catagory of how to spice up gay sex, but when he was sent to Heaven to put up with the Mormons, he had to sharpen his brain and become smart enough to combat their sickening goodness, and it paid off. So with that added intellegence, Saddam figured out a problem with getting the book back this easily. Butters and Wendy probably escaped somewhere- but why didn't they take the book with them? He knew that Wendy wanted that book to translate the spell that would take her to Purgatory to rescue Stan, it should have been so important to her that'd she escape with the book so no one could take it from her. That should have been the case unless....unless she already had the spell translated and would use it to go to Purgatory to see her beloved if she wasn't stopped now. Although Saddam had the book, there was no way he'd let that bitch go to his place to see some boy after what she'd put him through.  
  
"General, you're not done yet! I want you to send more troops to the area and not leave until the girl and that foo foo boy with her are in your custody! Don't argue with me, just send in everyone you can get right frigging now and find those bitches!"  
  
======================================================  
  
As Saddam figured, Wendy and Butters had indeed escaped the house before the troops got there. Since Wendy had heard the general talking to Saddam and figured out quickly why they were there, she and Butters used their head start to slip out the back door and out of sight before the soldiers covered all the exits. And like Saddam thought, they left without the book because Wendy already had the two translated spells they needed to get to Purgatory and back in her pocket, so the book was now useless. Now as they walked into the busy part of town and hid next to one of the business buildings there, the only problem was finding a deserted place to use these spells unnoticed.  
  
The two kids saw that more troops were now in the area but were marching through the area between the two rows of buildings. So since they were too busy marching to look to their lefts, Wendy and Butters ran off to the back of one of the buildings. They then noticed the back door of the place was open, and it led to a small storage room with no one inside it. This seemed like the perfect opportunity for them, as they could go inside, hide behind some boxes just in case someone came in, repeat the spell to Purgatory quietly, and then get sent to their destination without any troops seeing them leave. So with that, they both prepared to open the door slowly and finally make their way towards Purgatory and Stan at long last.....but the booming voice of the general interrupted their plans.  
  
"Attention, Wendy Testaburger and her dead friend!" The general and his men were in the center of town and they couldn't see Wendy, but as Saddam ordered him to do, the general spoke his plans out loud in case she could hear him. "We know you have the Purgatory spell and you plan to use it! But by the orders of God Himself, we order you to come out and surrender and not use that spell!" Of course it wasn't God's orders, but to keep Saddam from being outed as the Purgatory dictator in public, Saddam had told the general to pass the buck to God. Then he told the general to repeat his ultimatum, although it didn't seem that smart of an idea. But he went on anyway. "If you do not come out and surrender and not cast that spell.....we will use our military might to destroy the businesses in this part of town! We won't be able to kill the people here, but we will make sure that they lose their business and become total bums if you don't surrender! Do you really want that to happen just so you can see a boy again?!" Behind the building, Wendy had heard that and was having a hard time thinking of an answer to that question.   
  
"Wendy, what'll we do?" pleaded Butters, since his sense of fairness let him know that it wasn't fair for others to suffer because they wouldn't give themselves up. But he didn't even know those people, and he still had to help accomplish this mission for two people he knew very well. He figured it was lucky that Wendy was the smart one so he didn't have to make the decision on whether to go inside and cast the spell, or give themselves up. But right now Wendy was wishing she wasn't so smart, since this was racking her brain too. She knew the decision she had to make was to go cast the spell and ignore the military's threat- but her own annoying as hell sense of fairness told her it wasn't right to let hard working people suffer as a result of her greed. It didn't help that the general added, "You have 30 seconds to come out before we start torching the whole area!"  
  
Suddenly inspiration struck. Wendy was originally planning to just read the spell from the paper, but in 30 seconds time, perhaps she could memorize the whole spell and keep it in her head. She quickly got out the paper and read the spell over and over while she could. Her plan was to come out before the military torched places, then once she knew the people would be safe, she would repeat the spell without having to reach for the paper, and be transported to Purgatory before they could stop her. But Wendy wasn't actually going over the plan in her head for that long, she was just busy trying to study the poem/spell. After about 22 seconds, she figured she remembered enough to repeat it word for word, so she told Butters she was ready to give herself up. Before he could protest, she said, "Don't worry, I have it all worked out. Just trust me and hold my hand when I start saying the spell." Fortunatly there was no time for Butters to ask any questions about that plan, so Wendy just grabbed his hand and led him over towards the center of the town. There the troops were just about to start laying siege to the stores exactly one second before they spotted Butters and Wendy coming towards them.  
  
"We surrender, we're ready to be taken in now!" After Wendy gave herself up, the general actually heard Saddam make a noise of disappointment before he ordered him to have the kids surrounded. The rest of the people there quickly went back inside since this didn't concern them or their financial future anymore.  
  
"So kids, you thought you could steal from people in Heaven, eh?" asked the general. Wendy took it as her chance to recite the speech while she remembered it all. "I gotta admit, it was pretty foolish of me. I don't know what to say. Except.....See the journey to come to pass! The trip ahead will be a blast!" Saddam yelled really loud in the general's ear to shut her up before she finished the spell, so not knowing what else to do, he fired a warning shot over her head with his gun. This threw her off track enough for another soldier to grab her and cover her mouth so she couldn't speak again. She tried her best to find a way to bite the guy's finger off, but it wasn't working.  
  
Butters thought as fast as he could to remember word for word the last two lines of the spell. When he thought he had an idea, he started speaking rapidly. In fact, he spoke so quick that the soldiers were too impressed to shut him up at first. "See the journey to come to pass, the trip ahead will be a blast! If a journey to Purgatory you seek, just repeat those words to achieve-"  
  
Under Saddam's orders, the general kept him quiet by shooting Butters. It only slightly grazed his leg, but it left him in enough pain to forget the last two words. It also gave the soldiers enough time to grab him and cover his mouth up too. "Okay, we finally got them under control, now what?" asked the general out loud, to which Saddam answered, "Take them on a little trip to God's palace, and gag them up for His sake already! What are you, dumbasses to let them get away with that twice, geez!" So some of the soldiers figured they'd better go purchase a few gags before they went on their way.  
  
======================================================  
  
Wendy and Butters were gagged up and had their hands tied up, then they were put into army trucks for the drive to God's palace. Of course since this part of Heaven was far away from the major city where God lived, the drive took some time. During that hour drive, Wendy did everything imaginable with her tounge to try and loosen the gag so she could whisper the spell and escape. She tried pushing it with her tounge, nawing at it with her teeth, anything she could think of. Finally, once the drive ended and the truck parked in front of God's palace, Wendy had played around with the gag enough so she could actually have the ability to talk, though the gag was still on. Once the soldiers instructed them to get out, Wendy gave a reassuring nod to Butters as they got out, then held his hand so she could go with her as she whispered the spell so no one could hear it this time.  
  
"See the journey to come to pass, the trip ahead will be a blast." She kept whispering and no one heard her, since the troops just focus on leading her and Butters inside the building. "If a journey to Purgatory you seek-"  
  
"Ec neado se po silenco dominion Wendy Butters!!"  
  
Wendy clearly didn't say that or talk that loud- that unique voice actually belonged to God Himself. Under Saddam's advice, God cast a silence spell on both of the kids so that even without the gags, they could not talk. Therefore, they would not be able to interrupt anyone by casting the spell and escaping to Purgatory after all. And judging by the fact that Wendy wasn't able to whisper anything now, or make a sound when she tried to talk louder, the silence spell was quite a success. Wendy still tried to talk and then yell however, and since the soldiers were puzzled by this themselves, they didn't know how to react. Plus, Butters just found out he couldn't make noises even with the gag in his mouth, so he was getting just as confused too. Clearly some order had to come back to the scene.  
  
"Ey guys, relax! We're getting pretty lonely upstairs, so could we settle all of this there, if you don't mind?"  
  
If Butters or Wendy could make any noises of shock at seeing Saddam Hussain walk down a large staircase to greet them, they would have made quite a few of them. 


	13. Act 3, Scene 3: Confrontations

At this particular moment in God's main chamber room, no one was there other than the Lord Himself. He figured He'd better savor that moment while He could. Soon Saddam would be back to plead for a harsh punishment for Butters and Wendy, and like always, He'd have to agree to his demands. It was either that or give Saddam a reason to stay in Heaven and lay siege to the place in typical Saddam fashion. And on the other end of the spectrum was Wendy Testaburger, the only other dead human that had ever given God such a hard time on such a consistant basis. And now because God would not let Wendy see Stan or take him away from Purgatory, she had stolen a book to get there herself. Even if God was not under pressure by Saddam, He knew He had to punish her somehow and make her stop this and move on with her life. He knew how hard it was for her to lose Stan, but it was the will of Heaven and she had to learn to accept it now before she did something really drastic. Tough love was needed for this meeting, since she wouldn't back down even without the ability to speak. But she had to learn to back down anyway, and do it now.  
  
At that moment the whole gang came inside the room, the soldiers, Wendy, Butters, and Saddam. The gags were now off of the two kids since they still didn't have the ability to make a noise, and by now they'd given up trying to break the silence. And once Butters saw the form of God Himself, he was too taken back to even attempt to talk, both out of reverence for seeing the Creator of the Universe, and in shock in trying to figure out what the hell he looked like. Wendy had seen His strange form a number of times, so the shock had worn off for her, she just wanted to get down to business. God got that business started for her though.  
  
"Miss Testaburger. I can't say anymore that I'm relieved I haven't heard from you in a few weeks, since you obviously used that time to plan out your little escapade.", started God. "Luckly Saddam figured out the basic part of your plan, but I discovered the rest. You only joined the soul takers club and killed this kid so you could steal that book, didn't you?" Wendy of course, could only nod yes as an answer. "I can't tell you how much this....disappoints me."  
  
"All right, you're good and angry now, so let's get on with the punishing already!" Saddam was obviously hoping for a harsher punishment for Butters since, because of his bias towards men, it wasn't as much fun to see a girl suffer and have her body abused. But God wasn't even looking at Butters as His attention was still on Wendy.  
  
"Wendy, you have to learn to move on. It wasn't my fault that Stan died, he took things into his own hands and altered his fate, not me. He would have been here soon if he had just learned to control himself, so no offense, but I think you need to blame Stan for this more than me. It's hard, I know, but it's the truth and you need to accept it so you can be happy here."  
  
Not only did Wendy not take God's advice, she was even angrier at the Lord now. She went back to trying to say something without any success, and God was now even more relieved He cast that spell- since if she didn't use her voice to go to Purgatory, she would have used it to get into a huge fight with Him and His head already hurt from hearing Saddam's voice. Wendy was still determined to find some way to let God have it, but how could she without her voice? How else do you communicate with someone when......and then she remembered.  
  
Wendy turned around and although her hands were bound together, she moved them around as much as she could in an attempt to make God untie them. God was pretty confused by this, so in an effort to make sense of this, He indeed untied her hands. After all, even if she did attack Him, He was all powerful enough to hold her back and Saddam was there to use his own....special skills to hold her back. But when Wendy's hands were undone, she didn't use them to attack Him- she used them to talk. She was using sign language to speak her thoughts, a skill she used during a project in the 10'th grade. She worked with Timmy and used sign language as a way to hold a conversation with him, and although he could still only say "TIMMY!!!", with Wendy's help they used sign language to hold a lot of conversations together, which made it easier to talk to Timmy. Now she was using this power to communicate with the Lord, and God got what she was doing quite quickly. He started to translate her words as the others and Saddam were still clueless to the whole thing. "God, uh, what the fuck is this? Why are her hands moving around in a way that has nothing to do with handjobs and every other sex thing that hands are good for?", inquired the ignorant Saddam.  
  
"Saddam, may I answer you later?" God would have just said shut up and be quiet to anyone else, but of course He had to be more delicate with Saddam. He'd have to worry about that later as he decoded what Wendy was saying with her hands. "She's saying if she can't blame me for Stan's death, she can always blame me for her demise, since Stan wouldn't have killed herself if she didn't die first." This wasn't the first time Wendy had brought that up, but God didn't know what else to say about it other than it was what had to happen. He tried to respond anyway. "Wendy, I know the fate I gave you with dying so young and so tragically was cruel, but I've done a lot worse to a lot of people that deserved it less! This was not a personal thing, it was just business, and truthfully you could have died in ways that were more horrible. I could have decided that you would die from Widmark killing you in prison, but I decided it wouldn't happen and you had 7 extra years with Stan as a result. So you see, I've been both cruel and kind to you."  
  
"And that makes it better?!" Wendy spoke in sign language. "You've made it so that I could be puked on for years, be a total bitch a lot of the time, come to my senses only after Stan almost died from agin, be put through Hell on Earth in prison, and now this!! I've been hated by so many people in my life, and I've given them reasons to hate me a few times, but I didn't want to! It was in my nature to rub people the wrong way, and you gave me that nature! Why me, huh?! Why did you love making me go through torture and then take me away when things go really good? Why me?!!"  
  
"Because that was the fate that the powers that be gave to you." God answered out loud- even though no one else translated sign language well enough to know what question Wendy was talking about. "Wendy, you were given some bad breaks, but we gave you the strong will and spirit to overcome them. You were a survivor until the end, and I figured that your strong spirit would help you move on and realize you can live a happy life here without Stan. After all, you already have a friend here and your other friends will be here eventually. Heck, it'll only take 20 years for Bebe to be here."  
  
"That's not good enough, I want Stan! I wouldn't have put you through so much trouble today if you just let me go back to him in the first place! Besides, you knew how far I went for him in the past, I killed for him before! Why are you so surprised I did this?!", asked Wendy with her hands.  
  
"Honestly, I shouldn't be. But steps must be taken so that this never happens again."  
  
Saddam now stepped in since he was assuming the good stuff was finally coming. "Oh yeah, lay it on them, baby! Smack them down, then I can take my book and transport souls from Heaven to Purgatory with an extra kick in my step, or something!" This was the first time Wendy heard about why Saddam wanted this book- and it was basically for the same reason she wanted it, only with less good intentions. If she wasn't pissed then, she was now at the cruel and horrific hypocrisy on display.  
  
"You won't let me go to Purgatory to find my boyfriend, and yet you're letting this asshole take away people from Heaven to go there! You told me that was against the rules dozens of times, and yet you're letting him break them and not me! What the fuck for?!!" Wendy almost hurt her hands because she was using the sign language with such anger and fury. She had hit on a very sensitive subject for God and had almost exposed how cowardly He was to listen to sadistic dictators and bend the rules for him and not for someone more deserving. But the consequences of not doing that would be disastrous, and Wendy had to understand that and why what she did was so dangerous to the afterlife as a whole. But since He didn't want Saddam to join in this discussion, God told Wendy His answer in sign.  
  
"Because unlike you, Saddam can wreck the entire afterlife if I don't listen to him. Because he knows how to get to me and how to drive me insane, and how to ruin the fabric of Heaven itself! He would have overthrown Heaven and ruined the lives of it's citizens if I didn't give him Purgatory and give him everything he wanted, including this! So now you must know what you almost did today could have wrecked everything! You might have made the life of one soul better if you got what you wanted, and I emphazize the word might- but you would have destroyed the lives of millions in the process! You almost gave Saddam a reason to destroy everything we hold dear as a punishment for your actions!"  
  
"And you're so weak and such a pussy that you couldn't have stopped him, or put up with him earlier?! He's obviously torturing the love of my life in Purgatory, and all because you didn't have the balls to subdue him in Heaven! So who's really to blame for that, huh God?!"  
  
After Wendy's angry answer, her and God traded exchanges in sign language that no one could understand. All the others could get was that they were both looking more and more upset as their hand movements became faster and rougher. None of them looked willing to admit the other had a good point, they were both too committed to their own visions about what must be done. God's will would not be altered and neither would Wendy's- but as it turned out, unlike others that bowed to God's will, Wendy's will became so strong that she literally pushed God and shoved Him to the floor since she was at her emotional peak. At that point she was gonna get the ability to talk back by any means nessecary.  
  
Wendy grabbed God by the neck and used Him as a shield before the troops or Saddam could shoot her. Butters didn't know what to do to help, but he went next to her and God anyway so he could be nearby if he was needed. Wendy had one arm wrapped about God's neck, and she used both hands to make some kind of demand in sign. The soldiers asked what she was saying, and God answered, "She's demanding that one of you repeat the spell I cast on her so she can be able to talk again. She's ordering that this happened or else she'll hurt me."  
  
"Oh come on, it's not like you're gonna die or anything!", Saddam crassly answered. "You could use a good beating after you fucked up so much today, even if you came up with that cool voice spell! I should say Ec neado se po silenco dominion Wendy Butters to people that bug me!" God almost chuckled at the fact that Saddam throughly fucked up this time. By repeating the spell ver batum, Wendy and Butters got their ability to talk back.  
  
"Wow neato, we can talk and make all kinds of noise again!" Butters yelled out with glee. But Wendy was able to contain her joy so that she could get back to business right away. "See the journey to come to pass, the trip ahead will be a blast! If-" She would have gone on if not for one new problem- Saddam had grabbed her neck with one hand and put a knife to her mouth with the other. "Go on, guy! I've cut off lots of guys tounges to get them in the mood, but I have no problem just having fun with cutting off a bitch's tounge!" Saddam pressed the knife closer to her lips when Wendy tried to struggle free even more. "Aw come on, give me a break, it'll grow back tomorrow and just stop you from saying my spell today anyway!"  
  
Normally, Butters needed to think more before he could get himself brave enough to face a problem like this. True, hearing about the Purgatory dictator gave him the chills, and they were turned up even more after finding out the guy was Saddam Hussain, a guy who was nuts and scary enough before he got that job. Maybe the soldiers and God knew that already since none of them were making a move to stop this. Therefore, Butters knew he had to get brave faster than usual to face his fears on behalf of protecting a friend. To that end, it took about 2 seconds before he started walking towards Saddam's back, and after it looked like Saddam was really gonna use his knife on Wendy's tounge to shut her up, he balled his hands into fists. Then he hit Saddam on the top of his head, which loosened his grip on Wendy but made him move the knife so that it cut Wendy on the face slightly. But it did make him let go of the knife and give Wendy the chance she needed to recover.  
  
Butters and Wendy got together to grab Saddam before he fought back, and they dragged him over to the fireplace in the room- making sure to place him right in front of the fire. "Ay, what the fuck is this?! Are you retarded enough to think you can hurt me with a fire, I'll just heal tomorrow!" But Wendy had a clear answer for Saddam's arrogance. "Butters, get Saddam's knife." As Butters went to do that, Wendy explained things further. "It's true that you'd heal tomorrow if you got burned up. But there's one thing I found out in my research that you were too stupid to remember. If I cut off a body part of yours, it would grow back tomorrow.....if it was still intact. If it got blown up, destroyed, or burned apart, the body part would not grow back. I've never tried it before, but maybe it's time I gave it a try." Butters handed her the knife and for the first time, Saddam was actually concerned with what she might do with it, and what she might cut off.  
  
"Okay God, we've had enough fun now, get them off me." God stood there not knowing what to do as Wendy kept holding Saddam down nearby the fireplace, and Butters held his legs down so he wouldn't kick his way out. "God, this isn't funny anymore, get them to stop playing now! You know you can't defy me!" God knew that better than anymore, but now He was starting to think of the possibilities of Saddam losing his....special place. If that happened, he'd lose his whole reason for living and never do "it" to any guys again, and without that, he couldn't live. He'd be so depressed and so bitter about losing his member that....that he'd be too distracted to run Purgatory, or to annoy God or Satan again. They could lock him up in a prison and feel safe that he wouldn't try to escape, since without his manhood and without the means to have gay sex, what did he have to live for? And how could he remember to blackmail God and threaten him with his penis gone?! But all Saddam was thinking and saying was, "God, order the troops to put 10 holes each in these two now!"  
  
"Troops....stand down." God now had His way out from dealing with Saddam and his threats to wreck Heaven or Hell again, and He wasn't gonna let the troops ruin it now. Perhaps if Wendy succeeded in her little theory, He might have an excuse to reward her and get her off his back as well.....  
  
"Butters, keep holding his legs down, I got the rest covered!" Butters did as Wendy said, and she started to take care of the rest by unzipping Saddam's front zipper. Normally Saddam wouldn't mind that except at times like this, but this time it wasn't a good thing. Now all Wendy had to do was actually put her hand in that area, pull out the target body part, cut it, and toss it in the fire to finish the job. She was a little uneasy about having to touch something that had been in practically every dirty place there was in existence, but it had to be done. For Stan.  
  
Wendy held Saddam's hands together with one hand, and used the other to put the knife in her mouth so her hand would be free to explore Saddam's pants. God and the soldiers continued to stand there in hopes Wendy would succeed, and Saddam got more and more pissed at them and swore to burn them alive if he ever got out of this. But how could he get Wendy off her to do that before she did to him what that other girl almost did to....."That's it!" Saddam acted quick to speak the one thing that would throw Wendy off track. "Say Wend, it's funny that you wanna cut off my ding dong to see Stan, because I saw his ding dong getting real busy last night! Mainly cause I hired a girl to rape the shit out of him by shoving his thing in her!"  
  
"YOU WHAT?!!!!"  
  
Wendy should have used that info to cut Saddam's thing off quicker, but she was so stunned by the news of what her beloved went through that she was thrown off track just like Saddam wanted. Butters saw this a lot faster than Wendy did. "Come on Wendy, aren't you gonna cut his weiner off now?!" But by the time he finished asking that, Saddam had got his hands free from Wendy's grasp and he shoved her away from him. Butters acted fast to tackle him before he did even more damage, and then once Wendy recovered, her rage finally kicked in and she pounced on Saddam. This time, she was probably gonna wind up eating his nose or eyeballs out if she could. But the problem was, although Wendy got plently pissed when girls came near Stan like that, Saddam got even more pissed when thinking about how close he came to never having sex again. His rage over that was the only thing imaginable that could subdue Wendy's rage over Stan being touched by another woman. And Saddam's rage won as when Wendy strangled him, he strangled her back hard enough so that she let go, then she grabbed her and threw her right at the stunned group of soldiers. For good measure, he got up and kicked Butters to the floor so he couldn't do anything. He then zipped his pants up and got up to compose himself before he got mad again, this time at God.  
  
"God, I noticed my penis was in danger and you did nothing to stop it, as if you wanted my main man to be thrown in the fire."  
  
"But, but it didn't, you outwitted them and stopped them from emasculating you!" At that point God stopped in realization- His dreams had died just then. He could have gotten the edge over Saddam and successfully locked him up forever if he lost his manhood, and He stood by because he trusted Wendy to do that for Him. But she couldn't even do that. She had failed and in turn, she had doomed God to be nothing better than Saddam's bitch again. Cause now he was so mad that he could very well order the destruction of Heaven as a result, and He wouldn't be strong enough to stop him and his fury. Before that happened, God concluded the obvious- Wendy had to pay for failing Him. "Troops, seize the captives again!" And the troops did just after Wendy and Butters recovered from the fight and just before they were ready to attack Saddam again.  
  
"Wendy, Butters, you committed a serious crime last night, and attacked me and Saddam today. This calls for a serious punishment." Now that Wendy was slightly calmed down, she remembered that she could still cast the spell out loud and escape. Unfortunatly, God knew that too.  
  
"I hearby decree that I shall cast a spell in which you both forget the two Purgatory spells you memorized today. This way, you will not be able to transport yourself to Purgatory, and with Saddam holding the spells book, and the fact that you have a lifetime ban from the soul takers group, there will be no possible way for you to go away to see Stan Marsh now. Because you committed a crime against me, you must pay the penalty, and the ultimate penalty for you is to lose your own chance to see your boyfriend ever again." God quickly added that last bit for Saddam's sake because since this was indeed the ultimate punishment for Wendy, it would please Saddam enough to back off.  
  
"You've got to be shitting me!", yelled Wendy as eloquently as she could. "You're only doing this because I didn't cut off his ding-dong and get him outta your hair, or whatever's on the top of your stupid head!" God was in no mood to fight with her now, especially after she had failed to cripple Saddam, so He started casting the forgetful spell. "Du ma cheney forget me spell to purga!"  
  
God had another line left, and by then Butters was looking frantically for a way to stop this. Since this canceled out his fear of going against the Master and Creator of the Universe, he focused clearly on his task. Finally in the middle of God's spell, he got his task set- he kicked the soldier behind him in the crotch and ran towards God to tackle Him as he finished the spell. "Forget purga to permanent Wendy Butters!!"  
  
By the time Butters actually tackled God down, it was a split second too late. Both of the kids heads hurt like Hell for a second, and then when they recovered, both of them tried their best to remember the two Purgatory spells, but they couldn't. Taking advantage of their current state, God got Butters off of Him, and then used his mental powers to transport Butters and Wendy out of the palace. They would be put back into their house in their Heaven town and deal with their failure there. Now with that out of the way, the hard part of the day began- trying to appease Saddam for letting him face castration alone. But Saddam wasn't even gonna let God get a word in edgewise.  
  
"Look God, you tried to fuck me over just now, but I won't take it out on you. I have my own ways of making you regret shit like this. So I'll tell you what, I'm gonna stay right here today and tomorrow, and I'm gonna tour all of Heaven, then use my new Purgatory spells to take anyone I want back to Purgatory with me to be my slaves!" Saddam took his new book and held it up to prove his point, which was that he was gonna take any number of souls from Heaven over the next two days and make them slaves in his kingdom. And God knew that if He refused Saddam's plan, he would use the anger from a while ago to destroy the lives of Him and all his dead children here. So it would be better for Saddam to take a few hundred souls with him, instead of destroying the spirit of every single person here.  
  
With that, God agreed to take Saddam on tours of the Heaven towns, where he could use his new spells to send anyone he wanted to Purgatory. Truely, no one but Saddam had come out ahead in the last 15 minutes, not God or the people in Heaven, and certainly not Wendy or Butters. But now that they had failed God, He didn't really care about their suffering right now, and was actually quite proud that He did what He did to them. At least it was one thing He would be proud of in the next two days. 


	14. Act 3, Scene 4: Trying to recover

"Godammit it! Goddamm piece of shit motherfucker, GODDAMM IT!!!"  
  
That could very well have been Wendy's first words after she and Butters got sent back to their home. But although it came close, that saying didn't come from her. It came from Stan. In Purgatory, the word had gotten out that Saddam had left for the day to see God and get spells that would transport people from Heaven to Purgatory and back. Word also got out that the book had been stolen by Butters and Wendy because they wanted to come here to get Stan out. And then Stan heard about how they had failed and had lost their one chance to rescue him. Hence the yelling and cursing at Saddam for stopping their plans.  
  
As Saddam promised, he was staying in Heaven until tomorrow night so he could send souls here in Purgatory- and indeed, people originally from Heaven were popping in by the hour. Saddam left his Imperial Army in charge to keep the people in line and to "help" the new souls adjust to their new home. They didn't need to use Stan to show the newcomers how bad they would suffer if they stepped out of line, so Stan just got to sit by himself during all the madness and think. As usual, his thoughts were on Wendy, but this time his thoughts about her were a little different.  
  
Wendy had defied God to get back to him. Wendy had taken on the Creator of everything in existance and fought Him and Saddam himself to reunite with him. She had even gotten Butters to be brave enough to help her in the quest- he would have expected Butters to turn and run when Wendy wanted to kill him in the first place. But he didn't, and their efforts came so close to succeeding if the reports were right- Saddam just outfoxed Wendy at the last moment. And now God was punishing her for it by making her forget the spells she had learned and made sure she'd never be able to come back here now. But if just a thing or two had gone a little different, he could be seeing her right now at long last. Yet now it looked like it was all over.  
  
But Stan had been thinking it was over for months, and during that time, Wendy had fought the powers that be endlessly to prove that it wasn't. And what had he done? Put up with Saddam's madness and let himself get forced into female rape.  
  
Now Stan not only felt sad, he felt pathetic. All he had done during his stay here was moan and cry over losing Wendy, and in between that time Saddam had his fun tormenting him. It was natural to assume that Wendy had done her share of moping and crying as well, but she had, unlike Stan, overcome it to do something productive. She hadn't given up on him and, like she did once before, she killed someone to get back together with him. Only this time it was for good intentions so she'd have some backup on her mission, and it almost worked. That was what Wendy had done over 4 months, and at the risk of being very repetative, what had Stan done?! Nothing.  
  
Stan was far too smart and too brave in his first life to take all this lying down now. He always knew that, yet he couldn't find a way to fight back against Saddam or this whole unfair situation. He would have rather lay on his back on ground with lava below it than get up off his ass and do something. But now that couldn't take place anymore. If Wendy could fight back against impossible odds and almost succeed, why couldn't Stan fight against impossible odds and finish what she started?! There really didn't seem to be a good reason not to other than Saddam, and he would be gone for one more day....  
  
And with that, Stan officially decided to get up off his ass and get in the game. Saddam was gone for now, and he was gonna find some way to take advantage of it....one way or another.  
  
======================================================  
  
"Fuck!! Fucking King of the Universe fucking me over instead of that Iraqi gaywad!!"  
  
And in contrast, that was Wendy's first reaction when she got sent back home. However, unlike Stan, her mood and determination did not increase when the dust settled. For the rest of the day, Butters and Wendy tried to brainwash some solutions to the problem, but nothing worked. God would certainly not listen to them now, Saddam had the book and was using it to enslave people of his choosing, Grandpa Marsh followed through with God's order and banned them both from the soul takers club, and no one else would tell them what those two damm Purgatory spells were. In fact, no one would talk to them period. Even though Saddam's identity as the Purgatory dictator had been revealed, he had also used his new fame to tell everyone that he wouldn't be taking souls to Purgatory if Wendy didn't piss him off so much. So by the time the day ended and the night passed, people were too scared of being taken away by Saddam that they couldn't help but blame Wendy.  
  
By the time the sun rose on the next day, everyone in Heaven was in a panic because at any moment, they could pop out of sight and into Purgatory thanks to Saddam casting a spell on them from God's palace. Practically the only people not scared of being sent away were Butters and Wendy, and that was only because they had already been robbed and screwed over by the Iraqi and his puppet. As a result, there seemed to be no hope left. No solutions presented themselves, no one would help them after the events of today, and Saddam would probably be inspired to torture Stan more than ever when he got back. What other happier ways were there to look at this thing?  
  
As the morning began, Butters got out of his bed after only a few hours of sleep. But at least he had been able to get to his bed, as when he got downstairs, he saw that Wendy hadn't even gotten up from her couch. Her eyes were slightly open yet she looked too out of it to go to sleep, and she looked like she would fall from the couch if she moved- yet that probably wouldn't snap her out of this either. Butters approached her with some trepidation, since the slighest wrong thing said might set her off in her fury and pain....which was exactly why he and everyone else wouldn't go near Stan after his death, and look how that turned out. So with that in mind, he had no idea how to approach her, but he had to do it anyway.  
  
"Wendy? Are you gonna get up and get ready for today?"  
  
"Why?", Wendy asked in a voice that was far from sounding eager to get up or do anything of the kind. "I'm starting to get comfy here. I spent 10 hours straight thinking of any possible way to find Stan, and I got nothing. Now I'm so worn out and ready to give up that I just wanna take a load off here for a while. It's not like anyone wants to talk to me now anyway."  
  
"Give up? But, but you're a genius and you need to see Stan more than anything, what's with the give up talk all of a sudden?!" Butters knew very well why things were hopeless since he wasn't that dumb, but he would have thought Wendy would overcome this and not back down from the pressure. Fine time for her to start giving in now. "Butters, I'm tired. I told you I've thought about every possible plan I could try now, and all of them wouldn't work. God doesn't want me to get what I want, even if he wasn't Saddam's bitch. Saddam probably has millions of guards at the palace ready to shoot us down if we went back there to get him. The soul takers club won't help us, the public won't wanna help me after they all get taken away, so what's left? You're supposed to be smart, you tell me what might work cause I don't have shit!"  
  
"I got....aw geez. I really got nothing." Butters said although he was tempted to lie so Wendy would get off the couch- but once she found out he lied, she'd probably break some stuff over his head, so that option was out. So Wendy just stayed there and kept having no energy to move around that much. "I like to think I thought of everything since I got here. I double checked my entire plan and didn't let myself think that I might fail. I had to keep looking on the bright side so cynicism wouldn't get in the way of me finding Stan. But.....now that I've really got no options left, what's to stop me from giving in to it? I don't know why, neither do you, so why fight the inevitable anymore?"  
  
"Wendy, I, I know that's how we should be thinking, but, but something tells me that we shouldn't leave it alone like this! Don't you still wanna see Stan again?!" That was the fuse Wendy's bottled up rage needed to blow up. It did so by making Wendy stand up and grab Butters by his shirt collar. "You Goddamm think I still don't want that?!! Why the fuck do you think I'm so Goddamm depressed if I don't wanna see him again, so don't tell me that shit!! I have an exhausted brain that's tired of thinking plans that won't work, but it can't even remember the one spell I need to see my boyfriend again! So don't push me with those lies, got it?!!"  
  
Her anger and frustration after 10 hours of slowly realizing there was no hope left had broken through. But when she got herself to look closer at how fearful and sad Butters was after hearing that speech, the anger went away and the deep, dark depression returned to her with a vengence. Wendy sank back on the couch and turned her back so she didn't have to see him again and face how wrong she was to take this out on him. Hell, she didn't even have a reason to blame a little blame on him this time unlike at the party, he wasn't the one who lost her composure thanks to Saddam's tactics! She fucked up this time! Now as a result, she couldn't face Butters or anyone, or face that all her planning was for nothing- or that she killed her friend for nothing. But that was at least one thing she could fix.   
  
"Butters, I want you to go back now. I'm sure I can at least get you back to life at the time I killed you. You don't need to be around for anymore of this, you still have a life to live. So let me at least give that to you now." Butters needed about 10 seconds to take that in, since Wendy was now offering him his trip back to Earth and to his live family and friends- but when he left, Wendy would be all alone in her harsh reality that she'd never see Stan again and nothing could be done. He still didn't want to accept that even though all the evidence said he had to. Finally he figured he couldn't leave on that much of a bad note. "No, Wendy. I don't wanna go yet."  
  
Wendy still laid there with her back turned, so Butters went on with the explanation. "You're right, I don't know how to get Stan back and there might not be a way to do it. But, but I still don't wanna go away like that. When you died, I was the last person to see you alive but I didn't even get to say a proper goodbye. I wouldn't wanna leave you behind in a way that's just as tragic as that." A plan started to form in his head just then, which he spoke out loud right away. "I'll tell you what. Why don't we go out and try to have some kind of fun, since this is probably gonna be my last full day here! Maybe I can't get your mind off of losing Stan for good, but I want to try! That'll be a nice way to send me off, and maybe if we have enough fun, some kind of idea could pop up at the same time! I think it's worth a shot!" If Wendy thought so too, she was doing a good job of hiding it by not making a sound.  
  
"Okay Wendy, I know that people might not like seeing you outside today after what happened. But that's a great reason to go out with me. Once I leave, you won't have anyone else here that'll wanna talk to you or cheer you up or care about how much you're suffering although you don't deserve any of it! You might as well try and enjoy yourself with a friend until then!" Butters waited and waited for Wendy to either agree or object or do something to answer him, but nothing came. But after a minute or two, she finally got up and said quietly, "Give me a minute to clean myself up."  
  
======================================================  
  
Once she got herself to look presentable, Wendy joined Butters outside as they just walked into the busy part of town and tried to do whatever they could to enjoy themselves. Fortunatly, no one around them said anything about yesterday or blamed them for making Saddam come here, because they were too afraid of being sent away. Saddam was still casting spells to send people to Purgatory, so any one of those people could be next. Therefore, if they were going to be taken away from Heaven forever, they wouldn't spend their last moments of joy getting in a fight with these kids. So things were actual more peaceful than Wendy expected- though there were a few tense moments after a few people literally faded away because Saddam sent them away from Heaven for good.  
  
By the time it became night, Wendy's mood hadn't really changed all that much despite Butters best efforts. But then again, Butters tried to remember that there really wasn't anything here that could make her forget about yesterday. He felt so helpless now since no matter what he thought up, it couldn't erase her memories of how much she loved and missed Stan. However, he promised to do something that'd give her some brand of fun, so as a last resort, he asked for Wendy's remaining Heaven money and used it to let them in to the nicest resteraunt/lounge area in town. Perhaps a nice meal and some relaxation might make some impact.  
  
A bunch of people were already there since, after all, they may be having their last meal before they'd be forced to eat scraps in Purgatory. So Wendy and Butters were going to have to wait a very long time to get a table for dinner. To pass the time, they found the lounge area and sat down on one of the couches to pass the time. None of them knew what else to do or say, or knew what, if anything, they should bring up in conversation. Finally Wendy noticed that there was an open bar nearby and two of the people sitting down to drink had just disappeared. Now that Saddam had struck again, she went over to one of the empty seats. Once Butters noticed that, he worried more than ever and ran over to stop her before she ordered something bad- she was too underage to drink, but it wasn't like drinking would give her health problems now. Not wanting to take chances, he sat down next to her quickly. "Wendy, you don't gotta get drunk to have a good time and feel better! I know I've sucked at trying to cheer you up, but you don't gotta drown yourself in beer because I suck! What would you know who say?!"  
  
"Bartender, can I have two glasses of root beer?" After Wendy gave out her real order, Butters found himself able to calm down. And in fact, the root beer she ordered for the both of them wasn't that bad at all. At least it calmed Wendy down enough to talk a bit. "You didn't have to make such a scene, I may be depressed but I'm not that hopeless to start drinking."  
  
"Sorry, I didn't know that. I mean, you seem ready to give up and that's not like you, so who knows what else you could have been capable of?" Butters pointed out.  
  
"Look, it's not that I gave up, it's just....I wouldn't feel like I was ready to give up if I didn't think of everything imaginable I could do to get him back, and I told you I did that for 10 straight hours. Nothing seems feasible after what happened yesterday." Wendy sighed in her renewed frustation. "When that kind of crap happens, you can't help but think about the future. That I may be stuck here in this impressive but overrated Heaven without the man I love for all eternity. How can you possible look forward to living like that for centuries, especially knowing that it could have been so different if Saddam didn't get to me? How?"  
  
"I don't know, I'm no smarter about that than you are. But, well....it's not like you haven't overcome the odds before!" Now Butters finally saw an opportunity to boost Wendy's ego, by reminding her of her far more steller accomplishments on Earth. "I'm sure you thought it was impossible that Stan could love you and stop throwing up after the aging incident, but he did! I'm sure no one thought you could stop being a controlling bitch, but you did! And hell, it was downright impossible to think you'd see him again after going to jail, but you got out and saw him for 8 straight years! And you did all that when you were 9 years old, no one could probably do that if they were 29 or some other old age with a 9 in it!"  
  
"How does the past help me that much now?"  
  
"Wendy, you've always been one of the bravest and strongest people I know. Look, Miss Ellen said that if you were so evil to get rid of her 10 years ago, you'd be more evil now since you were older. That's not true, but if it's possible to think you'd be more evil when you're older, you gotta assume that you could be even more brave and strong than you were 10 years ago, and that would be something! So if you could beat the odds back then, why can't you do it now?" Wendy took some time to try and think of why it couldn't be done like Butters said, and although she knew it couldn't, this time the feeling wasn't of such doom and gloom. Some confidence was there too.  
  
"Maybe that's something. I never liked giving up on anything just like that when I was alive. But it could take me months or years or decades to come up with a plan as good as the last one! But....what else am I gonna do here?" That was probably the best vote of confidence in herself that Wendy could come up with, so Butters stayed quiet to let her come to terms with that. Instead she went off on another topic of conversation.  
  
"You know Butters, this is one of the things I missed before I got you here. When I was at my low points when I first got here, there wasn't anyone to cheer me up. I knew no one here and all of my closest friends and family were gone." Wendy sank back down in her seat a little with this newest form of sadness. "It's not just Stan I miss up here. I miss my Mom. There were a lot of times I could have used her here to calm me down when I had nightmares about the whole thing. I miss Bebe too, it's really no fun here without Stan or a best friend like her to fill in the gap. I miss Kyle and I miss Kenny and even Cartman too.....I never would admit that I always had so much fun tearing him apart whenever he called me a hippie bitch. I miss Chef and the other boys and the other adults and....." Wendy brought herself to catch her breath and to look right at Butters as she finished her talk. "And until I came to your room that night, I really missed you too."  
  
Before Butters got tempted to cry a little, he swore himself to ask a question he'd really been having a hard time figuring out. "You missed me and all those other people, and yet you chose to kill me and make me your helper. Why? It didn't matter who you took to get in the soul takers club, so you could have picked Bebe or Kyle or your mom or anyone else from Earth. Why did you pick me instead?"  
  
"Because I knew I could count on you to do everything you could to help me....and to pick me up if things got real bad, like you're doing right now." And for the first time in the entire last day and a half, Wendy made her mouth move to form a small smile. "There really isn't anything that can make me forget about what's happened or really cheer me up, but you've tried your dammdest to do it. And, well, although this isn't gonna get me to forget about how bad things are, I really can't tell you how much I appreciate you trying and going all out for me. So thank you. At least for a few days I had the help of a real friend before I spent the next few decades by myself with no one I know."  
  
"Well, uh, I'm sure Bebe and the others will be dead faster than that! And once people stop being mad at you and start getting to know the real you, they'll wanna be your friends too. That sort of thing happened to you on Earth, why can't it happen here?"  
  
Now that Butters finally ran out of nice and optimistic things to say, he went back to drinking the last few drops of his root beer. As for Wendy, she had indeed told the truth about how she was feeling now- nothing could erase the lonelyness and sadness she would feel without Stan, but for this one night, she felt a little less overwhelmed by the darkness because someone was there with her. Someone who understood her emotions and wanted to do whatever he could to make her feel safe and a bit better. And at that moment, for the first time since she arrived in Heaven, Wendy felt safe and relaxed, if only for a brief time before reality set back in. But until reality came back, she could spend her time thinking that if she got back down again, Butters would do his best to think of something to say or do to lift her up....like Stan always did in the good old days.   
  
Butters was no Stan and he never would be, but next to Stan he was the most sweet, compassionate, and admittingly cute boy Wendy had ever known. And even though the moment was tarnished because Stan couldn't be there for her in her darkest time of need, she was very happy that Butters was the person who was taking his place instead.  
  
With those thoughts, Wendy felt relief and relaxation for the first time all day, and she kept that feeling after a table became avaliable for her and Butters and they finally went off to have their meal. 


	15. Act 3, Scene 5: Turning up the heat

At about 10 PM, after Wendy and Butters had their dinner and began to talk about things other than Stan, they got themselves to go back home. Butters agreed that he would allow Wendy to send him back to Earth tomorrow morning, so he would stay this one last night to make sure Wendy's newfound hope stayed a while. They wanted to have a nice, long sleep so they could be well rested for their goodbyes tomorrow, so they went to their respective beds at about 10:30 and headed right to dreamland.  
  
But it was around 11:30 when Butters got woken up from a knock at his bedroom door. He barely got himself to get up and open the door to see Wendy standing there in a purple nightgown.  
  
"I can't sleep that well. Everything in my room reminds me of Stan, I wrote down all my notes and plans to get him back in that room. I threw that stuff all out, but the room still reminds me of how I spent countless days planning to get him back and how I failed. So can I stay in here?"  
  
Butters was puzzled a bit by her request, but he gave in and agreed. Wendy would sleep on his bed and Butters took a spare pillow and blanket with him so he could sleep a little soundly on the floor. It would have made more sense to go sleep on the couch, but Butters wasn't really awake that much to think of that more logical idea. So he went back to sleep on the floor while next to him, Wendy tried to get more comfortable sleeping in a room that didn't have so many bad memories.  
  
======================================================  
  
The roles had truely been reserved between Wendy and Stan although none of them obviously knew it. Before, Wendy was working hard for them to be together again while Stan had just accepted it and became miserable thanks to his guilt and Saddam's little games. But now, while Wendy morned, Stan took action. Because if Wendy could go up against both God and Saddam since she loved Stan so much, Stan could surely take on Saddam because he was too much in love to be denied anymore. And after spending the whole day planning things out, he had his means to do it.  
  
When the day began, Saddam was still in Heaven and new souls were showing up every few minutes. The army was left in charge to break them in and keep order, and according to them Saddam would return to Purgatory as soon as the next day began. It was about 2 PM in the afternoon when Stan heard that, so he figured he had 10 hours to get this off the ground. He knew Saddam would be returning with the Purgatory book, and that book contained the spells he could use to transport himself to Heaven and find Wendy again. It was just a matter of getting himself in position to steal it from him.  
  
Saddam's army was quite loyal to him while he was around, but now that he was out for the day, it was easier for Stan to ask for some help in getting in the mountain home. When Stan found a few people on the inside willing to help, they told him what passwords to use to get in and what rooms Saddam might go into and other such helpful tidbits. Of course they didn't do that without making Stan promise that he wouldn't rat them out to Saddam if the worst happened. So after dealing with that for a few hours, Stan was ready to make his move.  
  
At around 11:20, a half hour before Saddam would make his return to Purgatory, Stan went to the back of the mountain. Once the loyalists guarding it were sent away by one of Stan's new allies, Stan was able to make his way inside. Remembering the passwords he learned earlier, he was able to navigate from room to room inside the mountain, until he got into the main chamber room where Saddam talked to him a few days earlier. He turned out the lights to the room, closed the doors, and just waited in the shadows. Saddam was bound to come inside any moment, and Stan would be ready to surprise him. There weren't any weapons in the room, so Stan couldn't cut off his penis like Wendy almost did, but all he needed was to beat him up enough to get the book and use the spells before he became conscious.  
  
Once everything was set, Stan just sat on the couch bathed in black shadow, ready to spring into action once the door opened. Saddam was scheduled to come back by midnight according to his army, so the wait really didn't have to be so long. It only seemed like it was dragging on for decades to Stan. But at last, he heard some whistling and humming that could only have come from the dictator himself. With that signal, Stan got up and got himself ready to attack.  
  
The humming got louder and louder as Saddam came closer to the door, and finally it opened and let some light into the room. Fortunatly for Stan, he got out of the way before any of the light hit him. Saddam was now in the room, still in a happy mood over the fact that he had about 300 new souls from Heaven to do his jobs for him, and he could take more at any time. He went to turn on the light in anticipation of a relaxing night of masterbating and dreaming up hard tasks for his new servants tomorrow. But when the lights came on, he was met with Stan coming up right behind him and grabbing him by the neck.  
  
"Have a nice trip?", asked Stan as sadistically as he could to the son of a bitch. "Where's my book?"  
  
"Aw geez, what now?!", protested Saddam since he just got over almost losing his balls yesterday, now he had to deal with this lunatic. Of course when he turned his head to see who was holding him, he just had to laugh. "Goddamm, I always get the pussies to try and kill me, don't I?!"  
  
"Where's the book, Saddam? You brought back a book from Heaven, so give it to me." Saddam made no attempt to answer, but in a second Stan noticed that he did have an extra accesory with him- a backpack that was now right between Saddam's back and Stan's chest. So Stan threw Saddam to the ground and forced the backpack off him before he could fight back. And before Saddam could get up and tackle him, Stan put his foot right on Saddam's chest to keep him pinned down and busy while he looked through the backpack. The pack contained all sorts of files on people who would probably be sent to Purgatory next, but in the middle of that collage of objects was the book of Purgatory spells. But before he could even get the book out, Stan had his leg bit by Saddam.  
  
Now free of Stan's shoe, Saddam went for the book the minute Stan fell to the floor from the leg bite. But Stan recovered faster than Saddam expected and before they knew it, they both held the book and were wrestling for control of it.  
  
"Give it to me, Saddam! You don't need a troublemaker like me in Heaven anyway!", yelled Stan during the fight. But Saddam struck back by commenting, "Oh no, I don't mind a few troublemakers at all! Makes it more fun for me to screw their asses over quite liter-" Unfortunatly Saddam had learned nothing from how he inspired Wendy to almost strangle him, as Stan was now more inspired to kick Saddam's ass. And he did as he got up, grabbed Saddam, and threw him into the nearby coffee table. Since he wasn't getting up, Stan used this break to pick up the book and leave the room. He closed the door, saw that no one was around, then leaned against the door as he looked through the book to find the spell.  
  
"Dammit, all these spells are in symbols! I heard that the Purgatory spells were the only ones that were written in symbols, but he had to have translated the ones I need in here!" The process of finding these spells wasn't made any easier once Stan heard banging on the door behind in. "Let me out, asshole! That's my book that I blackmailed outta God fair and square!", called out Saddam. Stan used all his back strength to keep Saddam from pushing the door open as he kept going through the book. Finally he saw one group of symbols that had English translations written below it.  
  
"So now the journey is at an end, you visited the place of the suicidal dead."  
  
"Goddamm it, I knew I shouldn't have written the English translations in the book! Damm God for not having any spare papers to write on!" But Saddam's pleas fell on deaf ears as Stan continued the spell. "To get back to Heaven and your old home, say this to leave Purgatory and-"  
  
Saddam had written the translation to that spell so that he didn't need to call God on the phone to go to Heaven anytime he wanted. Now it was about to bite him on the ass....or it would have if Saddam hadn't stepped back, ran towards the door, and did a karate kick to knock down the door and Stan before he finished the spell. Saddam always knew his sex moves on Satan would work in a non sex situation, and it did at the best possible time. For Saddam, that is.  
  
For Stan, the kick to the door knocked him down to the floor just before he would have been sent to Heaven, and before he could get up from the floor, Saddam pinned him down this time. But Stan was resilent and got himself out of Saddam's sleeper hold, and soon they were both on their feet and fighting each other in the halls. Surprisingly, none of Saddam's loyal troops were hearing any of this, not even when the two fighters stumbled through another door in the hall and kept fighting in another room with a window in it, even though the book was all the way back in the hallway. But Stan was fighting to take Saddam out and then he would get the book- now he knew he couldn't leave Purgatory without giving Saddam a special thank you ass whooping for his "hospitality" Too bad Saddam was too experienced in fighting and war to go down quickly.  
  
And it was too bad that the fight ended in the only way possible in a sitation like this. Since they were in a room with a window in it, of course the two fought so much that they crashed through it. And they were in a room that was high up, so the fall outside was pretty big. They were gonna land on the ground, and each of them tried to pin the other down to use as a cushion for the landing. But none of them got the upper hand and they both landed on the ground with no cushion.  
  
Both Saddam and Stan naturally weren't hurt enough to die from the fall, but they were both badly hurt and unable to move, and barely able to stay awake. But Saddam got the upper hand in this fight as his loyal troops got to the bodies first before the other souls of Purgatory thought of going there to tear Saddam apart while they could. The army surrounded the bodies and checked to see if Saddam could talk well enough to give orders. And although blood was dripping from his head, he could still barely talk. "Take us....back inside. We'll be able to heal in 6 hours, and I want both of us to be comfy until then." With that, the Saddam loyalists picked up the bodies and took them inside to get them to rest until they healed again. Then Saddam would be well enough to decide what to do about the whole incident, and what to do about the latest love sick freak that attacked him.  
  
======================================================  
  
At around the time this fight took place in Purgatory, Wendy and Butters had just been able to go back to sleep in Heaven. Despite sleeping on a less comfy space than the bed, Butters had already slept well enough that he went right back to his slumber with little trouble. And now that Wendy was in a room less filled with memories of her failed plans, she was eventually able to doze off. Soon she was in as deep a sleep as Butters was by about 12:30 AM.  
  
At about 2 AM, Butters woke up by himself somehow, and then found himself having to pee. Despite the fact he was pretty sleepy and unwilling to get up, he got himself on his feet and went to the bathroom to take care of things. When that was done with, he walked back into the bedroom only half awake and groggy in the head. And thanks to that, he forget to go back to his bed on the floor and he sat on the regular bed next to a sleeping Wendy. It took him about a minute to realize that, but he was already so comfortable on the bed, so he figured he could stay there for a minute before he went back to the floor.  
  
Butters lay his head down and felt ready to go back to sleep on the bed anyway, but he snapped out of it. Perhaps seeing how Wendy was sleeping and determining if she was having trouble dreaming might keep his mind sharp and make him unable to doze off. He carefully turned his head to look at her, not wanting to make enough noise to wake her up. She actually looked peaceful enough, so perhaps she wasn't having nightmares about Stan after all. Apperantly his attempts to get her a little more confident may have worked- at the very least she should be inspired enough to keep trying to get to Stan after he left. Now that made him feel very relieved about the whole thing. And a little upset when he remembered that the whole reason she wasn't back with Stan now is because God would rather listen to a crazed gay dictator than Wendy.   
  
How the fuck He could basically say that Saddam needed to be happy a lot more than Wendy did was beneath Butters and was quite infuriating to him. This was just another case of people rejecting Wendy because she unintentionally got on their bad side, a trend that caused her enough problems when she was alive. Why was it so hard for important people or Gods to see that Wendy didn't deserve to be screwed over like this?! If they could get it through their heads who she really was, or if they could see how serene and peaceful she looked while she was sleeping, they'd think twice about killing her or rejecting her for sure! But at least she was resting peacefully now after the hard day she just had. There were no troubles shown on her attractive face for now at least.  
  
Butters actually got himself to be more relaxed himself the more he looked at his friend. He breathed heavily at one point and smelled something. It was quite impressive that even in the afterlife, her straight black hair still smelled as enticing as a bed of roses just like it did on Earth. In her sleep it hung from her head perfectly with no knots or anything to make it less straight and impressive. It really complemented her face when she was both asleep and awake, especially when her deep green eyes were open. Butters didn't know why he was thinking those thoughts, but his best guess was it was probably because after tomorrow, he wouldn't see her for another few decades and this was his last chance to really take in her beauty. And it only added to his point earlier- she was one of the best friends he'd ever had, she liked him and appreciated him for who he was when other popular kids didn't, and she had the hair, face, body, and figure of a walkway model. Why would God favor Saddam over a intoxicating creature like that?  
  
But at that point, the intoxicating creature tossed around slightly and began to wake up. Her eyes opened just enough to see Butters next to him, and he immediatly felt embarassed. "Oh jeez, sorry I was so close, I just felt tired for a second there!", Butters pleaded before he would get up and go back to his regular bed, but Wendy lay a gentle hand on his arm before he carried that out. "It's okay, I told you you'd probably be better sleeping here or on the couch anyway."  
  
"Oh, okay, I guess. So, uh, did you wake up cause of nightmares or something?"  
  
"No Butters, I just woke myself up like you must have done, I feel okay for now." Not knowing how else to answer him, Wendy just lay back on the bed and Butters did too once he felt safe. Wendy then continued by stating, "I actually feel a little silly now. Once this thing dies down I should be able to get back to work in finding someway to get to Stan again. I spent too much time on it already to just give in after just one failed plan." Butters smiled widely since his goal for the night had come through after all, and he turned to see that Wendy was looking at him with a smile too. "I probably wouldn't have figured that out so easily if it wasn't for you though. I didn't officially thank you for taking me out earlier, so thank you so much then."  
  
"Uh, sure! That's what friends are for even in death, um, right?" To Wendy, they sure were. Now feeling really happy that her confidence was back, and feeling so greatful to Butters for doing everything he did for her, she inched closer to him on the bed and almost without thinking, gave him a not too shabby kiss on his cheek.   
  
Right after that, however, both of them felt pretty embarrassed and they got themselves to lay down on their backs, both staring at the celing. But after a while, Wendy turned her head back to look at Butters as he still stared upwards. She was really going to miss having him here. But she knew when he went back, he was gonna feel a lot better than he did before she came to kill him, and he was gonna go on with his life and do a lot of great things for people for sure. She felt really proud for that, though she pretty much knew for some time that Butters, for all the hell he'd gone through, would go on to be just as succesful and happy than most of the other less compassionate kids in class, if not more so. Julia would come back to him, or if not, some other girl would find him and easily fall in love with the guy. That was pretty far ahead in the future to look towards, but it was something that wouldn't be far from the truth, since Butters would really make whoever he got together with a lucky woman, and then when they had kids, he'd be one hell of a father. She could only laugh to herself about what kind of son Butters would have and how he'd make sure the young one wouldn't go through the same kind of hard times he went through- it almost pained her that she wouldn't get to see something like that herself. It just made it more obvious that she would really miss him.  
  
Right at that point, Butters turned and finally noticed Wendy was staring at him. But Wendy didn't turn around right away as she got herself to look into his eyes- she never noticed how blue they were and how well they suited him. The little twinkle in them really made it look like he was still 9 years old at heart, which he in some ways was. The way he had grown up kinda threw you off though. Wendy had to admit that Butters had always been quite cute, but back then he was just cute in an adorable, boyish way, not handsome cute like Stan was. Now the handsome parts and the still cute boyish parts of him had really balanced out. As Wendy took that in, Butters was still puzzled that she was looking at him still, and he turned his eyes away from her....but something drove him to turn them back towards her a second later. And as much as he wanted to turn around and go back to sleep, for some reason, he didn't want to turn away. The way she was looking at him and the way it was easy to get lost looking at her face was just too much for him. And as the seconds went by, both of them were pretty much losing their ability to think rational thoughts that would normally scream at them to turn around right now.  
  
Instead, Wendy's rational thoughts had turned off so well that she leaned in and gave Butters a brief kiss on the lips this time.  
  
And thanks to that, the last of Butters normal thoughts were completly washed away. All that was left was the sensation of that brief moment, and despite himself, he found himself leaning over and being the one that was kissing her for a brief moment this time.  
  
And before any of them could recover enough to think straight, they both joined in a mutual kiss that lasted longer than one second.  
  
And once that was finished, the full on making out began with both of them not having another thought in the world- though they really should have.  
  
Wendy put her hands on the back of Butters's head to deepen their kissing, and after Butters lay his right hand on her soft and impossibly smooth face, he gave in to another temptation and buried that hand into her long beautiful hair. By the time Wendy slipped her tounge into the boy's mouth, he was almost right on top of her. The French kissing went on for about a minute as Butters's left hand started to go down lower to touch her silky nightgown, and Wendy put her hands on his back. Finally the two were out of breath and put their tounges back in their own mouths and stopped kissing- but instead of getting their brains back in order to realize the implications of what they were doing, once their breath came back they kissed again. Only this time it was more slow and gentle so they could savor the feeling of each other's lips pressed together. Butters almost shuddered at the intense feeling and pleasure that gave him as they kept kissing, and his left hand now started feeling and caressing the sleek curve of her waist. Then he lifted up the gown ever so slightly to feel her bare flat stomach.  
  
Wendy really was too caught up in this to think straight. As Butters moved his lips over to kiss the other parts of her face, one of his hands was running it's fingers all over her hair, and the other was trailing up her stomach. God, he was really good at this. It actually felt romantic the way he was paying so much attention to all her features equally, just like it was the first time this happened with.....  
  
Butters was living in a dreamstate of his own as he kissed Wendy's cheek and moved down towards her neck. He almost buried his face into her hair as he did so. In between feeling that, her neck, and the lower part of her chest now[though he hadn't gotten to her, um, chest chest yet], he really felt like he was in Heaven for the first time since he came here. She was so beautiful and perfect to him. He hadn't kissed a girl in 5 years, not since Julia left. But now he was doing more than that, and he wasn't in the right state of mind to mind it. Now he knew just how lucky Stan was to have done this with her the night before the accident, he sure knew how......how.....  
  
Reality came back big time to both of the temporary lovers. Just before Butters's hand came towards Wendy's upper chest, he saw what was happening in a rational way. Wendy's rationality came back at the same time as well.  
  
In the last minute and a half, they had both betrayed Stan.  
  
And now that Butters realized that, he got himself up and ran as far away from Wendy, the room they had almost done more than making out in, and the house itself as he possibly could.  
  
======================================================  
  
Sorry if that was too much of a shock to the hardcore S/W fans.  
  
Anyway, Act IV, Scenes 1-3 are coming August 3'rd. 


	16. Act 4, Scene 1: Revelation

What the fuck had just happened?  
  
It was a testiment to how crazy this was that Butters cursed when he tried to think of what the fuck happened. But what the fuck did happen?! Okay, he made out with Wendy, that was actually what happened. So he'd have to rephrase his question- WHY the fuck did it happen?!  
  
Butters had been running away from the house for about 10 minutes, and he finally stopped and sat next to a building to figure it out. Heh, he was sure picking a hell of a time to try and be rational now, where was his rationality in that bedroom? But then again, how could he expect to be rational 10 minutes after making out with the girlfriend of the guy he was trying to save?! Sure, that kind of plot happened in tons of movies that he saw[though he hadn't seen "Casablanca" or "Proof of Life" in many years], but that didn't help him here! Even a calm, non wussy person would have a hard time with this!  
  
After some time, Butters finally relaxed his brain enough to try and think. The first steps he'd have to take was to try and figure out the obvious in the situation and work his way up to the hard stuff. First of all, the answer to why he kissed Wendy to begin with might be simple to answer. He was obviously attracted to her and had been in the back of his mind for a long time- but who the hell wouldn't be attracted to her? Still, they had spent a lot of close time together in the last few days after he'd missed her for 4 months. Plus several hours from now, he'd be outta here and he wouldn't see her again for another few years or decades. One of those factors or all of them might be good excuses for him.  
  
But the next piece of the puzzle was a lot harder to figure.....why didn't Wendy push him away? She was in love with Stan more than anyone could ever love a boy, and a boy other than Stan was kissing her, so why did she kiss back? She should have pushed him away from the start and yelled at him for even coming near her. Instead she was kissing back and she had her hands on a low position of his back. Why did she take part in that? Was it only for one last fling before she sent him away, was she convinced she'd never see Stan again and this was the last time she could make out with someone she knew, was she trying to do this to keep him here and not want to go back to Earth, what?! He obviously couldn't ask her why since who knows when he'd have the courage to face her again.  
  
Now that he'd ran through the motives and excuses of the players, there was one more thing to think of- what now? If this meant anything at all, what exactly did it mean in the long run? Could he bring himself to see her again after this to resolve anything? Did she still want to see Stan after making out with another guy? Was she gonna want him to stay and refuse to send him back to life? And did he want to stay now? In restrospect, if he went back to Earth he'd be living in a far less nicer place with less real friends and an uncertain future- at least here he couldn't die or be hurt for more than 24 hours. The only people that would really really be that sad to see him gone were his parents and Julia, and who knows if she'd actually forgotten him with her busy schedule. Other than that, who would really miss him if he stayed here? In comparision, here there were no bullies, no one who would make fun of him in overly cruel fashions since people like that were in Hell or Purgatory, and he'd also be around the girl he....he....  
  
"Hey, who the hell's there?! You're not getting your germs on my box!"  
  
Of all people, Miss Ellen was now coming up towards Butters to add to his problems. But there was a box nearby where he was sitting, so he couldn't blame her for being suspicious.  
  
"Hey there, I didn't think I'd see you here again.", commented Miss Ellen once she saw who was there. "You sure caused a lot of panic today. I saw about 10 people vanish outta thin air today thanks to you and Wendy's misadventures."  
  
"Are you here to gloat, is that it?" Butters figured that if Miss Ellen was gonna gloat about Wendy's misery, he'd better let her get it over with now so he could focus on more important issues.  
  
"I would, but I told you I didn't want to get in the middle of this thing. Whether I would have given away your whole plan if Saddam's troops asked me to, well, we should both be glad that never happened. Not that it would have made a difference since you failed anyway." Miss Ellen leaned against the wall and sat down next to Butters to ask the rest of her questions. "So how is the little lady anyway? Did you come here to get away from her crying or obssessive behavior or something?"  
  
"I think I'm in love with her since I made out with her."  
  
"Well....wasn't expecting that, but okay." Suddenly Miss Ellen's mood became a little less tolerant. "Hey, wait just one minute!! She killed me because she thought I was after Stan and she had no proof! Now after all that and all her stupid planning, she's the one cheating on him with you?!! What kind of fucked up unfair shit is that?!!"  
  
"If I knew I wouldn't be here hiding from her, okay?!" This was hardly what Butters needed to solve his problem, so he tried to think of ways to get her off his back. "Look, I wasn't trying to steal her from Stan and I'm sure she wasn't trying to make me her new boyfriend, it, it just happened! Maybe it's because I never really lost that crush I had on her for a week in 4'th grade, or maybe it's cause I won't see her again after today, I don't know!"  
  
"You don't know? But you just told me you thought you loved her, how does that fit in?"  
  
"Well....I know I at least love her as my best friend. Maybe a part of me loves her enough to wanna be with her more, maybe that's what made me kiss her. But I guess.....I guess it's easy to admit that in at least in a few ways....I am in love with her." Butters sighed very heavily as he tried to regroup his thoughts. "But Stan was in love with her first, I can't forget about that!"  
  
"Or can you? I mean, Stan's all the way in Purgatory and after your stunt, you're never gonna see him again for sure. He'll never know if you and Wendy do it behind his back." Miss Ellen wasn't sure if she suggested that because she wanted to see Wendy with another man as some sort of indirect revenge, but it was the first thought about this plot that came to her mind.  
  
"I know that, but Wendy'll know it too. Let's be honest, she wouldn't wanna just forget about Stan and leave him to be tortured by Saddam just cause she kissed me." But Miss Ellen then pointed out one of Butters's main problems about the situation. "But if she was such in love with Stan, why did she kiss you back? If she shot me to the sun for just thinking I wanted to kiss Stan, she should have at least hit you for kissing her. Maybe she had some hidden feelings for you after all and thinks you could be a great Stan replacement. Why else would she have helped you all those times on Earth?"  
  
"Because she was being my friend, she was too much in love with Stan to want me to replace him back then! She just wants to be friends, I know it, and I....." Butters then started to realize something more important here. "I can't let her want to be more than friends just cause she doesn't think Stan'll come back. I spent the whole day with her so she wouldn't give up on that. But that was before this happened, so....what should I do?" Normally Butters wouldn't expect to ask advice from a homeless person, but he had no other options or better advice he could think of himself now.  
  
"You know, I think it's all a matter of regret. When I got killed I had tons of things to regret that I didn't get to do with my life, or with my dad. Then when he went to Hell thanks in part to you guys, that drove me to regret even more till I ended up here. The point is that you should ask yourself something, what would you regret more? Would you regret going back to Earth without getting together with Wendy, go back to Earth without reuniting her with Stan, or get together with Wendy behind Stan's back more? Which of those things would you regret for the rest of your life and get driven to depression and poverty because of it? That's the best I can do to narrow this down for you." With that, Miss Ellen crawled back into her box and counted on Butters leaving the area shortly.  
  
There was a chance he might feel real bad if he went back to Earth and had to say goodbye to her. There was an even bigger chance he was gonna feel sorry if he got himself to be Stan's replacement for Wendy or if he left without getting them back together....and there it was. If Butters went back to Earth without getting together with Wendy, it would make him sad for a while- but Stan left Earth and couldn't get back together with her, and now as a result, he was being tortured by Saddam Hussain. He would be upset for the rest of time.  
  
Butters now knew he had always been attracted to Wendy without really knowing it. He had always loved having her for a friend and to have her there for him in his darkest moments in the last 8 years. But there was someone who loved her more. Butters could make Wendy happy, but there was no possible way in any life that he could deliver joy and euphoria to her the way that Stan could. He knew that because he'd seen Stan and Wendy together for 9 years, through their every crisis and every bit of turmoil. He'd seen first hand what they did for each other and the sacrifices they had made. He knew that no possible relationship with him and Wendy could ever match up to the one she had with Stan, they just....belonged together. Stan believed it so much he killed himself to do it and failed miserably and tragically. And now because of his tragedy, he wasn't there to see what had happened here. And just because he wasn't there, it was okay for Butters to move in on Wendy? That was too fucked up and too mean for him!  
  
And that final detail clinched it. One of the things Wendy really liked about him was that every through his worst crisis, he was the same kind, caring, well meaning boy he had always been and his dark times hadn't turned him into a bully[well, at least it didn't turn him into a bully who was any good at being evil]If he thought he could be Wendy's new boyfriend, it would be the worst not nice thing to do, and it would have betrayed what Wendy most liked about him. If he did something mean and heartless like this to Stan, all of Wendy's efforts to make Butters happy and to keep being a kind person would have been for nothing. The only way to keep that alive would be to leave her be and say they could only be friends, no matter how hot that makeout scene was. But by leaving her alone like this.....she would still be alone without the one who could really give her everything as a boyfriend that Butters couldn't. How could he do that to someone he at least cared for a lot?  
  
There was only one thing to do. Well, first he had to get a pencil and a piece of paper, but after that there was just one thing to do.  
  
======================================================  
  
Dear Wendy,  
  
I love you. And I love you enough to know and understand I can never love you love you. There's only one person that has the right to do that. Even if it was possible for us to continue that makeout scene, I know both of us would think you'd be much happier if Stan was doing it with you instead of me. And just because Stan is in Purgatory and can never come up to see us here is no excuse to abandon him. You know that just as much as I do.  
  
For most of my life I've never really took action and took control of my own destiny. I resorted to being evil when I had no friends, then when I got friends back and a girlfriend I relied on them to help me. But there were times where I could feel very brave and do things I couldn't do before. When my friends and people I loved were in trouble, most of the time I put aside my fears to save them or do my small part to save them. You told me once that the true test of being a friend is being there for friends when they need you. Well, Stan is my friend and he needs someone to be there for him. I told you I would let you take me back to Earth after the sun rose, but now that can't happen. Now I've decided not to go back until Stan is here with you.  
  
I'm going to Purgatory myself after I force the spells out of Mr Marsh. I'll probably be ready to face Saddam by the time you read this letter. I know it would be pointless to tell you not to find a way to come down there since you'd just do it anyway, but I only hope I have things under conrol by the time you get there. I'm not being too optismistic though, it might take me a day, a week, or even longer to get Stan away from Saddam and come back here. But I refuse to leave there and leave the afterlife altogether until you and Stan are back together. That's how I'm going to express how much I care about you instead of making you cheat on Stan. That is the only thing I can do here that I wouldn't regret forever and ever until I got here for real. I hope you understand.  
  
Maybe I won't succeed and I'll just wind up never seeing you again, I don't know what's gonna happen. I just know I have to do this before I think of reasons why I shouldn't do it. But I still have the one big reason- because I care about you enough to give you the one you really love back up here. And if you see me again, I'll be presenting him to you.....I hope.  
  
No matter what, you are and always have been at least since 4'th grade, my friend. It's been an honor and a priveledge to be here with you. Goodbye until later on, or goodbye forever, it probably depends on how easy Saddam would give in to me.  
  
Love,  
  
Leopold "Butters" Stotch.  
  
For the second time, Butters had written a letter for Wendy. But this time, he left the letter in front of Wendy's house after making sure she wouldn't get up, see him, and try to stop him from his mission after reading it. He decided not to take one more look at her from a window before he left. He would see her again later and have Stan there for her as the only proper way to say goodbye to her, he had to believe that. After all, it was about a 20-25 minute walk to the soul takers club building from Wendy's house and he had to think of something. He already spent a few hours finding a pencil and paper and thinking of the words to say, so he'd already taken up enough time.  
  
======================================================  
  
By the time he got to the soul takers building, it was about 2 minutes before the sun rose. The building wasn't open yet, but Butters knew that people slept here overnight, including the old man he needed to see. He also knew the building would be unlocked shortly, so he stayed back next to the door and waited for his chance. About a second later, Grandpa Marsh was seen coming down the steps and heading for the front door to unlock it. Once he did, Butters charged in before Grandpa could utter a line of protest- but he made up for that by protesting once Butters got in.  
  
"What the hell are you doing here, foo foo boy?! You know damm well you're not allowed in here after that stunt you and the bitch pulled on us!" Butters really didn't need to lose his patience and anger now and have nothing left for when he met Saddam, so he tried politely to get what he needed. "Mr Marsh, I know you remember the two spells me and Wendy wanted from that book. I want you to tell me those spells so I can go to Purgatory and find Stan."  
  
"Fat chance, peckerhead!" Grandpa Marsh had a better reason to brag because 10 armed guards were running up towards Butters. "God thought we needed better security around here, now let's see if it pays off. Take the subject out, fellas." With those orders, the guards took out their guns and combined to shoot Butters 8 times in the chest before he went down. Satisfied with the work and figuring Butters would be in too much pain the rest of the day, he sent the guards away.  
  
However, what Grandpa Marsh forgot was that the sun hadn't risen yet, otherwise Butters would have felt the pain of those shots for the next 24 hours. Instead, when the sun came up, Butters gunshot wounds immediatly closed up, the bullets inside him disappeared, and he could breathe normally again. In fact, he got up fit as a fiddle. And once he got himself back to normal and turned to Grandpa Marsh, the old man now clearly regretted sending the guards away too early. Before he could call them back, Butters grabbed the old man and carried him away to another small room in the building before anyone else could see the action. Once they were all alone, Butters made his demands again. "Tell me the words to the two Purgatory spells right now."  
  
"No way, kid! Because of you and the girl stealing those spells, Saddam sent 30 of my workers to Purgatory! Good workers and killers at that! Why should I tell you anything?!"  
  
"Because Stan's your grandson and I have to save him from being stuck with Saddam so he can see Wendy again! Don't you love your own grandson enough to help save him?!" But Butters was once again being naive, which he figured out when Grandpa Marsh started laughing at him. "Are you fucking kidding?! I wanted to die for years and he wouldn't let me! He let me suffer in agony for years because he was too much of a fag to kill me, so he deserves to be fucked by Saddam! He can stay in there forever for all I care, so why the hell do you care?! Besides, now that Billy's gone you might have a shot at that nice piece of ass girl after all." Now that did it.  
  
Butters made his next demand after he had grabbed Mr Marsh's left arm and snapped the frail thing like a twig since it was so thin and fragile. "You like that pain, sir?! You're gonna be feeling that for the rest of the day, and if you don't wanna hurt in other places for 24 hours, you're never gonna say that about her again! Oh, and you're gonna give me the spells too!" But even though Grandpa was almost too much in pain to talk, he still called out, "Screw you, pussy willow!" After that, Butters kicked the old man's leg and he fell down with his hip broken into pieces now. "Tell me those spells or you can go the rest of the day with a broken neck!" Maybe that was going too far, but since Butters was still technically dead, he could do whatever he wanted to Marsh since he couldn't die. So since he didn't respond, he grabbed the old man's head and tried to twist it until he gave in. "Okay, okay, fuck it, I'll talk!!"  
  
Once that was done, Butters took out a spare piece of paper and a pencil from his pocket. "Tell me the first two lines of the spell to get to Purgatory, then maybe I can remember the rest myself." Luckly Butters left Grandpa in a condition to talk, so he was able to gasp out, "See the journey to come to pass, the trip ahead will be a blast!" Butters memorized those words in his head and tried to trigger something that would make him remember the rest of the spell that God had erased from his memory. He then asked for the third line and Grandpa Marsh got himself to say, "If a journey to Purgatory you seek....", but he didn't repeat the final line since that would send him to Purgatory himself. Fortunatly, that last line triggered the memory for Butters, and then he wrote down the entire spell, including the final verse. Of course that wasn't it as Butters still needed the spell to get back to Heaven, so he did the same thing as before- ask for the first three lyrics and remember the fourth by himself. Finally with the two spells written down, Butters was ready to go.  
  
"See the journey to come to pass  
  
The trip ahead will be a blast!  
  
If a journey to Purgatory you seek,  
  
Just repeat these words to achieve your feat!"  
  
And right in front of Grandpa Marsh's eyes, Butters disappeared in a flash of light.  
  
======================================================  
  
All Butters saw after he cast the spell was darkness. Darkness and ground. Because of that, he was wondering if the spell had really worked. But when he actually started to walk around to look for stuff, he saw what looked to be a mob of people from far away, and he thought he could see the vage outline of a mountain from very far away.  
  
This was just enough info for him to see that it had worked. He was now in Purgatory.  
  
"Well, the easy part's over, I guess." 


	17. Act 4, Scene 2: Saddam's Scheme

At the same time that Butters recovered from being shot in Heaven, the broken bones of Saddam Hussain and Stan Marsh began to heal in Purgatory. They were back in Saddam's living room and lying on seperate couches, but guards loyal to Saddam were posted around the couches to guard Stan once he got better. After the injuries healed for both combatants, the guards surrounded Stan before he could move around too much, whereas Saddam was allowed to run and jump around once he got his bones back together. "Oh man, you really don't appreciate your legs till you can't use them for about 6 hours, huh Stan?!" But Stan didn't really feel like agreeing with him since about 7 people were pointing a gun at his head. Saddam however, being the consummate dictator, wanted to get on with the business at hand. "So, you broke in and tried to steal my book. What do we do about that, eh?"  
  
"You might as well let me leave here. I'm gonna leave eventually anyway."  
  
"Oh Stan, you sure have a way of telling me you wanna take a lava bath. All you had to do was ask in the first place instead of cracking my skull.", quipped Saddam in a half joking and half upset manner. But that obviously wasn't what Stan meant. "Saddam, no matter what you do to me, I'm gonna come back eventually and fight you again. After a couple or a few dozen fights, I'll eventually win one and get that book from you. You won't have a moment's peace cause you'll be too busy wondering if I'll show up. So why don't you spare yourself all that bullshit and just let me go to Heaven now? This way there'll be no one left that's brave enough to challenge you."  
  
Saddam briefly thought that an idea like that was tempting, but only briefly. "Guy, why would I do that when I could just put you underground to burn for all eternity in lava?"  
  
"You don't wanna do something that simple. You'd rather torture me for a long period of time and make it all slow and painful. You'd do that just cause I'm so much fun to make miserable because I'm in love, and you wouldn't wanna lose that kind of fun that easy. I know you, Saddam, that's not your style." Unfortunatly, Stan was dead on right, and Saddam cursed himself for that- although merely putting him in lava would probably seem tempting after another few seconds. But again, it wouldn't be as much fun to let him off that easy. "Fine, but you know I'll just have to do those kind of long painful tortures now!"  
  
"And it'll just inspire me to come back here and fight you. Eventually I will get to Heaven, so I'm just saying there's not much point in delaying the inevitable. You won't get a moment's peace till I see Wendy in Heaven again." Now Saddam was getting as pissed as he suspected he would be. He sat down next to Stan to try and get his point across more clearly.  
  
"You know what I hate about you and, well, the straight population in general, Stan? You're so boring and one dimensional! All you do is bitch and moan about one stupid girl and do everything for one stupid girl, you wasted the last few years of your living life doing that when you could have had fun! You're a goody goody, a wet rag for bitches on the rag, and hearing about how you're in love all the fucking time is so fucking annoying!! You and all the straight assholes in the world have that in common, and I can't stand it! I'm the villain, I'm more interesting and I have a lot more fun, so I don't deserve to hear about your faggy love crap and all your other bullshit!!" Saddam moved closer to Stan and put his hand on his head before he grabbed Stan's hair a little roughly. "What am I gonna have to do to make you stop loving some girl's booty?!"  
  
"You'll have to kill me. Oh wait....you can't." Now Stan's confidence was growing more and more as he was finally really standing up to Saddam. But when two of the guards knocked him upside the head with their rifles, he wasn't able to think so straight as he fell back down to the couch.  
  
======================================================  
  
Butters looked all over the place for a house he could hide out in or some kind of workplace, or even a huge rock to hide behind. But there was nothing there, the entire area was bare- and even with shoes on, he could feel how hot the ground was. All he could see in front of him was a crowd of people, but none of them had Stan's blue hat on, so his search wouldn't end that quickly. But maybe some of the people there were new friends that Stan had made, so maybe talking to them might get him somewhere.  
  
"Excuse me, hello? Anyone? Where can I find Stan Marsh?" No one was answering him or even seeming to notice him. They were too busy muttering or yelling stuff about Saddam and his recent trip to take people away from Heaven. If they looked at him, they would have probably assumed Butters was just another new resident of Purgatory. But Butters kept trying to ask his questions over the rabble. "Hello, anyone?! Does someone here know a Stan Marsh?!"  
  
"Butters?" That certainly wasn't the answer Butters expected or really wanted from someone, but maybe it was a good sign that someone he knew recognized him. But when he turned around, all he saw in front of him were two....two hanging red things, for lack of a better word. Then he looked up and saw that it was just his old teacher, Ms Choksondick, who had those sagging breasts. "Ms Choksondick? I thought you died cause of semen from Mr Mackey, what are you doing here?"  
  
"I was one of the hundreds of people Saddam took here because of you and Wendy's rampage, that's how. Don't worry, I don't want to hurt you yet, if at all. We want to save our energy for taking Saddam out.", answered the aged ex-teacher.  
  
"So you don't know where Stan is?"  
  
"No, I have no clue. But maybe you can stick around with us, we're all going to confront the other person to blame for this, Saddam. Maybe once we beat him up, we can make him tell you where Stan is or something. In any case it's nice to have an extra pair of hands to beat him up for taking me away from Heaven before Mr Mackey came up to sex me up again!" Ms Choksondick barely managed to make herself civil again after reminding herself of what Saddam had taken away from her. "In any case, come with us and help us get revenge and I'm sure Stan will turn up somewhere." Having no other options or plans to go on, Butters blended in among this mob of people who had been taken away from Heaven. They would start marching towards Saddam's mountain top any moment, and Butters would watch the action till the time was right. Hopefully he wouldn't have to fight that much since he needed all the energy he could save up for rescuing Stan.  
  
======================================================  
  
Back in Heaven, Wendy had barely moved from her bed after Butters had ran away nearly 5 hours ago. Basically, all the thoughts Butters had thought about involving the make out scene were being thought and analyzed by Wendy- the issue of why Wendy didn't kick Butters's ass, the issue of whether she really wanted Butters to go back to life now, etc. But the biggest problem she was having was answering this question- had she really given up on Stan so quickly that she went and found another boy to take his place? What did that really say about her?  
  
And like Miss Ellen did, Wendy saw the horrible irony in what she had done- she went insane a few times over the thought of Stan finding another girl, and yet she was the one who was making out with Butters. And doing so while he was in Purgatory and probably about to be tortured by Saddam at that! How could she possibly do that to him?! Maybe it was because she had some unknown strong feelings for Butters that she didn't discover until tonight, but was that really a good excuse for this?  
  
It couldn't cause anything serious between her and Butters though. It just couldn't. She was supposed to get Stan back and spend all of eternity with her like they were supposed to, and that was all there was to it. All that happened in this bed was a mistake. She was probably at a low point when it happened, she was too overcome by all the help Butters gave her to really object to what went on, and she must have felt it wouldn't matter if Stan was gonna be stuck in Purgatory forever. But in her heart, she knew it did now.  
  
As wonderful as Butters was, he was no Stan. He didn't make Wendy have feelings of love she had never felt before like Stan did the first time they met. He wasn't so brave that he overcame his vomiting problem at the exact time she needed him the most, like Stan did. He didn't take a bullet for her in jail or have her back at her worst times the way that Stan did. And Butters hadn't given her 8 solid years of the kind of devotion, love, and magical memories that she shared with Stan. That was why she was so eager to get Stan back, so they could get back those times again and make new ones for the rest of time, which had been denyed them in life. Something like that was too valuable to throw away just because of one makeout session.  
  
So it was decided, Wendy was still gonna stay devoted to Stan and she would say so once Butters got back. Then again, it shouldn't be that hard since Butters was smart enough to know what happened then couldn't happen again because she was meant to be with Stan. Other boys would just want to keep going and get a piece of her anyway, but Butters was understanding enough not to even think that way. Now Wendy was really hoping that they could work this out enough so they could remain friends, and so there would be no regrets between them when he finally got sent back to life. Wendy would regret it for the rest of her life if she lost Butters friendship over this. The reason she probably went on kissing him was because he was such a good friend to her, so much so that she didn't want to be in love with him, but she couldn't stand not being his friend as a consulation. But after a while, she was starting to get impatient and annoyed by him since he wasn't back yet, he should have come to the same conclusions she did by now.  
  
Wendy stepped outside to see if there was any trace of Butters nearby, since he could just be hiding somewhere. But instead, she found the letter Butters left next to her doorstep an hour ago. She picked it up, read it, found out where Butters really was, and was overcome with more emotions than she'd ever felt in her life. Or at least too many to think of a proper way to react right away. Butters had understood things couldn't go any further between then, but he still loved her enough to go get Stan by himself. Maybe it was out of guilt for making out with her or maybe it was for some other thing that she was at fault for, she didn't know. What she did finally know was Butters was right in one part of his letter- she was gonna get there eventually. But unlike Butters who just went to the soul takers building to get the spells, Wendy remembered the club phone number and was just gonna call them to get the details. She ran over and dialed said number, then waited a minute for Grandpa Marsh to answer.  
  
"Who the hell is this, I can't talk to you today! I'm in pain here, you son of a whore!" Wendy chuckled out loud since she was pretty confident as to why Grandpa Marsh sounded like that. "Butters hurt you and he got the Purgatory spells, huh? Well, if you don't want me to come over there and make you hurt even more, which you know I'm nuts enough to do, you'll hand them over to me right now."  
  
======================================================  
  
Saddam was pacing around his living room with two problems on his mind. He just found out that the ex-Heaven people were gonna be marching in front of his mountain to protest being moved here, plus he still had to find a way to take care of the still unconsious Stan. How was he gonna send a message to the newcomers that they would suffer greatly if they challenged him, and then after using his best material on that, how would he adequatly destroy Stan's spirit? He couldn't kill him, and he couldn't give him the easy way out by making him drown in lava. In fact, the only major damage that could be done to him is if he got some body parts chopped up like what almost happened to Saddam in Heaven.  
  
And with that thought, Saddam had his answer for both problems in one fell swoop. "Guards, gag Stan's mouth in case he wakes up before the ceremony! I don't need him mouthing off while I'm showing him off to my new followers!"  
  
======================================================  
  
By the time the marchers got to the mountain, Butters found out from some others that Stan had tried to attack Saddam and failed, and he was probably in custody right now. Butters revised his plan so that he would wait until Saddam sent his troops to attack everyone, then he would go into the mountain and find Stan in the chaos. This way, everyone would be too busy trying to cut each other up to pay attention to him, even Saddam- or so Butters hoped.  
  
Finally, about a few hundred people including Butters were standing in front of the entrance, demanding Saddam to come out and send them home. Butters stayed in the middle so Saddam wouldn't notice him too soon. And indeed, when Saddam came outside to greet the protesters, he didn't see Butters. Also, he had his troops surround him to guard him against attacks. Once that was in place, Saddam felt safe enough to talk. "Ey guys, relax! You can't be mad at me just cause I cast the spell that put you all here!" And by the time he finished talking, Saddam would not only convince them that was true, he would take care of his other problem- and officially become the king of the dead while he was at it.  
  
"I know in your own fucked up minds you think this is my fault. But I know someone who deserves all that blame a lot more than me! Think of it, do you think I could have gotten away with taking you all here if God had the balls to stop me?! No, but I did because he did not!! Have the balls, that is!" This at least got the crowd to stop threatening to impale Saddam, so he figured he was making progress. And he wanted there to be enough progress so that when he brought God here with a new spell, the public would be too busy tearing Him apart to wanna hurt Saddam as he took over Heaven, a far nicer place to rule than Purgatory.  
  
"God is supposed to be the higher point, the last word in Heaven! Yet He so easily caved in to me and to my demands that your happiness end forever! If God was as powerful and infallable and all knowing as they say He was, He would have fought me to keep you in Heaven! But he didn't!! So who's the bigger criminal here, the one who takes you here or the one who doesn't lift a finger to stop me, even though that one is supposed to be the All Mighty God!! Why didn't he live up to that name when he needed you the most?!! And why would you rather blame me for your troubles rather than a faggot pussy like Him?!!"  
  
Not everyone was convinced that Saddam was right, Ms Choksondick wasn't and Butters wasn't really paying attention. But the majority of protesters seemed ready to believe that God was to blaming for not fighting for them in the first place, and the majority was good enough for Saddam. "There you go! Wouldn't you people that have seen the light do anything to get revenge on God for letting you down?! Well, I'm gonna give that to you in just a bit! Unlike God, I give the people what they want if it doesn't hurt me to much! I've put together a spell that will transport God here to Purgatory, where He shall face your justified wrath! The wrath of God won't have shit on you!" Those that had been converted to Saddam's side were now cheering at that possibility that they could physically pay back God here, perhaps enough that He could send them back and away from the crazed dictator. Of course, Saddam was going to take over Heaven in the chaos and enslave every dead soul in Heaven and Purgatory to do his bidding including these people, but they didn't know that yet.  
  
"So because God messed up, we have to forgive you for actually destroying our afterlives because of it?!". yelled the still vengeful Ms Choksondick. But it was the perfect way for Saddam to get to the next part of his speech. "I figured a few of you wouldn't get the point. But you're forgiven for being crazy....for now. Most of you get the point and will follow my revenge plan willingly, but if any of you are still unconvinced, bring out the guinea pig!"  
  
With that, Butters finally started to pay really close attention once some of Saddam's troops came out and dragged Stan into view. He was still out cold, but a gag was put into his mouth so he couldn't talk even if he was awake. Saddam went right next to the guard holding Stan to illustrate his final point. "I reward loyalty, but dissent, well, I don't like so much! And if you're gonna stay here forever, you have to learn something really quick off the bat! You go up against me like this guy did, you get the worst kind of suffering there is! I can't kill you, but maybe life without legs or arms might make you regret getting on my bad side instead!" To make that happen, Saddam reached into a holster on his belt and pulled out a big, 8 inch long sword. "This is what happens when you defy me! You lose your body parts, then I put them in the lava below us so you can never grow them back the next day! It's just a matter of which arm or leg I wanna cut off first!!"  
  
As Saddam poundered what to cut off first and if Stan should be awake or asleep as he did it, Butters made his way through the crowd to try and get to Stan in time. He didn't know what he could do to stop this. All he knew was he just had to try, and fast. 


	18. Act 4, Scene 3: Stan Strikes Back

Saddam had indeed decided to have Stan wake up so everyone could hear his muffled screams once his body parts were cut off. It took about 5 seconds for Stan to be jolted out of unconsicousness, and in those 5 seconds Butters had nearly gotten through the entire crowd to head for Saddam. Those 5 seconds felt like 5 lifetimes to Butters as he tried to decide what he was gonna do. Saddam had a sword and an army and people who now believed his anti-God rants, what did he have? All he had was the pieces of paper in his pocket which contained the two spells, and the pencil he used to write them down. Then again, Cartman proved a number of times in school that a pencil could hurt a lot if used improperly. So since Butters had so little time to think, that was his only option for how to stop Saddam.  
  
By the time he got to the front of the crowd, Stan was awake and trying to scream through his gag as he saw what Saddam wanted to do to him. The reality of the situation was still making fear corse through Butters's vains, as he knew if he got in Saddam's way, he could lose an eye or finger or hand or arm or leg himself. There was no way in Hell he would do this sort of thing on Earth, and even though his limbs would be reattached tomorrow if he lost any of them now, it still looked really risky. Butters didn't think he could ever have been brave enough to face this sort of thing at any other time in his life, so how could he be that ready for this now?  
  
The answer was very obvious to him.  
  
"For Wendy and Stan."  
  
He muttered that as a call to arms before he screamed at the top of his lungs to get Saddam's attention, all while he charged towards the dictator at the sametime.  
  
"You?!!" Sadamm couldn't believe it and that was all he had to say to express his shock. But he quickly recovered and got his sword into position to chop Butters's head in two once he got there. He raised his left hand and prepared to strike once Butters got close enough. Once Butters got real close to him, Saddam lowered his sword to strike his head....  
  
....but the sword wound up only stopping a mere inch away from cutting Butters face. That was because before it went any furter, Butters had taken the pencil from his pocket and drove it through the hand Saddam was holding the sword with. The intense pain had made Saddam's hand stop moving before he actually cut apart Butters head. And the fact that the sword was an inch away from Butters almost made the boy choke himself from being so shocked since he couldn't make a noise. But when it looked like Saddam was going to drop the sword from the pain, Butters backed away just in time. Now everyone could see the pencil that was through Saddam's hand, and even his troops were too surprised to react that well.  
  
And from that surprise, Butters went over to the guard that was holding Stan, and gently grabbed him away without being noticed. By the time Saddam screamed in pain and people were able to react by either laughing or getting angry, Butters had gotten the gag off of Stan and they had gone inside the mountain since it would be too hard to escape through the crowd. Once Saddam saw that they were gone, he felt too angry to care so much about the pain now. "You fuckheads!! Get in there and tear their asses off!!"  
  
Unfortunatly for Saddam, some people that still hated Saddam were now inspired to try and hurt him themselves so they could get back to Heaven on their own. Ms Choksondick led the charge for that, so Saddam had to put half of his army in front of the mountain so they could fight the protesters off. The other half would have to be used to find Stan and Butters, which was far less than Saddam wanted. But since the protesters were coming for Saddam, he had to focus on getting inside quickly so he could lead that half of his troops, and he did.  
  
As the madness outside took place, Stan and Butters were just running around the first floor of the mountain looking for a place to hide. But since Stan already knew about all the rooms in the place thanks to his research earlier, he found a closet near an elevator that they ran into before any of the troops came in the hallway. Once Stan peeked through the door to see that they ran off to look for any other places the kids could be in, he started to relax. In fact, this was the first time he was able to really realize that Butters was here, he had just saved him from losing a body part- and that if he was here, Wendy might not be far behind.  
  
"Butters....I, uh, how did you get here?", Stan asked since now he was overcome with shock because he knew about how God stopped him from coming before.  
  
"I had a talk with your grandpa and he helped me get here." Stan already knew about how his grandfather made a living and how he must have helped, but that thinking was for later. Now it was time to ask the big question. "Is Wendy here?"  
  
"I don't know, I came down here by myself. I figured that once she finds my letter, she'll find a way to get here too, so she might be here already. But if she is, at least she probably knows how to get out and meet us in Heaven." Stan took a while to take this all in, and to take in what Butters had done at the same time. "So....you came here and tried to rescue me by yourself? And you thought of risking your head being cut in two by yourself as well?" Of course Stan had to be surprised at that since Butters would have never been that brave on Earth.   
  
"I really had no choice, how else was I gonna get you and Wendy back together with you in one piece?" Suddenly Butters was struck with inspiration- this was their chance to escape. "Holy Christ, this is it! I just need to say the spell to take us to Heaven and then it'll be all over! I hope Wendy hasn't found a way in here yet, but if she has we can always go back to rescue her! Just hold my hand and I can get us both outta here!" Stan almost made a sound of joy since he now knew that Butters had recovered the Purgatory spells and he could finally leave here forever...but two new thoughts in his brain told him that he couldn't go yet.  
  
"We can't go now, Butters. For one thing, you said there's no way of knowing if Wendy's already here looking for us. And two, even if we leave now, Saddam can always go back into Heaven to track us down, and torture everyone in Heaven till he does it. As long as Saddam's in power here he'll never leave us alone, especially after what I did last night and what you did now! I want to be together with Wendy forever, but not if it means we have to spend that life hiding from Saddam forever too....or if it means he has to hurt more innocent people at the same time! We have to get rid of him now!"   
  
For the first time since he died, Stan Marsh was filled with the leadership and courage he had when he was alive and saving South Park from countless insane threats. And he used that confidence and his sharp mind to figure out what he had to do now. "And I think I know just how we can do it."  
  
======================================================  
  
On the night Saddam had someone rape Stan[for lack of a more fitting word], after Stan was taken out of the cell to rest, he overheard Saddam talking about a room full of weapons of mass destruction. He had aquired them from Satan and the evil people that were making them for their own amusement in Hell, and he was planning on using them to disfigure his servants if they got out of line. He wanted to keep it a surprise until he got more servants from Heaven though, which Stan found out when he confirmed this info with his contacts before his first attack. But now that Stan remembered what he had heard, he was gonna use those weapons against Saddam. The room that stored these weapons was on the sixth floor of the mountain, and after persuading Butters to help him find it undetected, both him and Butters made their way upstairs to the sixth floor. Fortunatly, Saddam and his men weren't searching there yet, and there were always a good amount of closets to hide in if needed.  
  
Eventually the youngsters were at the sixth floor, and Stan also remembered from his talks with Saddam's not so loyal men where the room to the weapons was, and what the password was to get into it. The door to the room would only open if someone spoke the password into an intercom next to this door. Stan quietly spoke the words so if anyone was nearby, no one could hear him anyway. "Satan's a bitch." Once he said that, he was able to open the door and tiptoe his way in followed by Butters.  
  
The room was relatively large and filled with guns, swords, barrels of radioactive material, barrels of other disfiguring substances, and missles. Some missles had been stocked in piles, and others were put in a launching pad and pointed up towards the roof. "Oh jeez, why would Saddam have all this stuff? I thought he couldn't kill anyone!"  
  
"No Butters, but he can blow people up to pieces to make them shut up though. I guess he was gonna get started on that after he got everyone to beat up God.", answered Stan, who was turning his attention towards the missles that seemed ready to be launched. One was in a launching pad and had a control panel of buttons that was below what looked to be a clock. "Just as I thought. Saddam's the type of guy that would have timers on his missles, this way he can say you have so and so minutes to give him stuff and he can have time to talk people into bowing down to him like a little bitch. Well, time for the real bitch to take it like a bitch now." Stan went over to the missle and analyzed the controls to find an idea as to how they worked. "If I can set this timer to make the missle launch in a minute and a half, it'll give us time to escape before this thing blows up the whole mountain. Then once Saddam loses his fortress, the people will have a chance to attack him, and when he finally loses power God will finally have the balls to lock him up for good so he can't blackmail everyone anymore!"  
  
"Wait, what if we can't get out in 90 seconds and the guards catch us?" Although Butters was still feeling some adreniline from his brave act a few minutes ago, he still felt he had to be cautious and make sure this idea was fool proof. "That is a problem, but if we gave Saddam any more time to get out before this thing went off, he might still be healthy enough to give us trouble today. So we'll just have to work our asses off to make the deadline and hope for the best." Stan then went back to work looking at the controls. They seemed simple enough, but if he pressed the wrong buttons things might get really bad really fast, so he made sure to be careful. Finally he pressed the right buttons to turn the bomb on, and now he was able to set how much time it would take for the missile to launch.  
  
"Wow Stan, you sure got better pretty quick. You were out cold a few minutes ago and now you're gonna blow up Saddam's mountain. I'm surprised you seem to be able to recover from pain that quickly." Stan tried his best to answer Butters's theory while keeping his mind on setting the timer. "It gets easier with practice, Butters. I had to do heavy duty work for Saddam, I was made into a love slave by one of Saddam's girls for a night, and I fell about 5 stories down this mountain just last night. By now with this and the 2 weeks I lived after Wendy's death, I'm really an expert about dealing with intense physical and emotional pain. But at least I'm finally starting to respond to it the right way now." As Stan went back to work, Butters felt that old familar feeling of guilt again. While Stan was falling down a mountain, Butters was making out with his girlfriend. While Butters was moping on Earth, Stan was being a slave in Purgatory. And it could have all been avoided if a few things had gone differently- and if Butters had done a few things different. Now there might be no better time to answer for these errors than the present.  
  
"Stan? Uh, just in case I don't get a chance to say this later on.....I'm sorry." Stan was getting the hang of working and setting the timer, so he could break away to hear what Butters had to say. "I'm sorry for getting Wendy in a position to get killed, and I'm sorry I didn't have the guts to try and talk to you cause I was too scared you'd blame me. Maybe if me and the others had the guts to face you then, we could have stopped you from thinking of killing yourself. But we didn't and I didn't, and they want you to stay here forever because of it." Butters caught himself before he started talking too much, since they didn't have all the time in the world. "There's a lot of things I feel sorry for, some of which you already know about and some....I don't wanna get into. But I really feel bad that I thought I missed Wendy more than you after you died. That isn't fair since I did miss you and you were one of the best friends I had in the popular group, and I really am happy to see you now. I just, I just thought you deserved to hear that from me. Wendy wasn't the only one who really wanted to save you and say I'm sorry. That's all."   
  
Stan was taken back to hear this from Butters, and he was still taking in the fact that he actually stood in the way of a sword to save him. This wasn't the Butters he knew when he was alive at all. But he just said, "You can tell me the rest when we get outta here.", since there was still a job to do that was almost finished. And after a second, it was practically finished as Stan got the time to read 90 seconds. Now he just had to press a button to turn the missle on and it would go off 90 second later. Once he did that, the boys would have to run like hell.  
  
And once he pressed that button, the boys got out of the room to run like hell.  
  
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30 seconds later, Stan and Butters finished running down a staircase all the way to the first floor. But once they got to that floor, they found themselves surrounded by a few of Saddam's troops and by Saddam himself, who no longer had the pencil stuck through his hand.  
  
"Ha, I knew staying here to wait for you to escape instead of searching floor by floor for you would pay off!" Saddam walked right over to Stan and Butters with a look on his face that was a cross between gleeful and bloodthirsty, if such a look could exist. "You hear the noise out there? Those stupid people are fighting my troops to a draw! True, my boys shot a few of them down and got that big tittied woman to finally shut up, but they just don't have the panache for cutting up annoying bitches! Maybe if I throw out a few of your remains like I PLANNED to do, it might teach them something!" With his other hand, Saddam pulled out another one of his big swords, which he was planning to actually use to cut something this time. But now Stan wasn't that concerned about it.  
  
"Fine, cut us up. In 30 seconds this whole mountain's gonna get blown up anyway." Saddam actually laughed at Stan's prediction, dismissing it as a lame attempt to keep his mouth intact for a few more seconds. But Stan was gonna make it clear that he wasn't playing around. "Now you got 25 seconds. I went into your WMD room, said the Satan's a bitch line, turned on one of your own missles, and now....it should be lifting off in about less than 20 seconds." Now Saddam was a little more concerned since Stan had the password down perfectly. "You're fucking with me, right? I programmed that thing to be a real destructive force, it could destroy most of this mountain if that's true!"  
  
"Then we'd better get going, shouldn't we?"  
  
Taking advantage of Saddam's temporary shock, Stan broke away from the troops after saying this and ran to the exit of the mountain, with Butters following behind him. By the time Saddam's troops were ready to fire on them, they'd already left. However, when Stan and Butters got outside the mountain, right in front of them was a mob scene filled with fighing between more of Saddam's troops and the people taken from Heaven. It would have been pure chaos to get through that scene- or it would have if they all didn't stop in place after hearing a huge explosion that blew apart a huge chunk of the mountain.  
  
Stan and Butters now found it easier to run off and get through the still crowd of fighters. They got as far from the mountain as they could, and Saddam and his troops had finally wised up and ran out at this time as well. However, the damage was still being down as debris from the mountain was beginning to fall- and when the rocks headed for the ground, they went through it to reveal the lava underneath. In fact, the explosion had taken apart the entire middle part of the front of the mountain, which meant that the top half of the mountain seemed ready to tumble down without so much support to keep it up. And as the earlier pieces of debris rained down and went through the ground, the top half of the mountain finally did come down.   
  
The entire peak came crashing down the rest of the mountain and crashed right into a huge portion of the ground. As a result, a huge hole on the ground appeared and now other pieces of debris as well as lava were flying around all over the place. Some people in the crowd were hit by the debris and were falling into the lava one way or another. For Stan and Butters, they were running away in the middle of a small shower of debris, and the ground was cracking apart behind them. Finally they got into a safe distance away from the carnage- but then they looked up and saw a somewhat huge piece of the mountain falling towards them, which was left over as wreckage from the first explosion. The two ran and dived for cover as fast as they could, but the force of the impact behind them caused them to almost fly forward and land harshly on the ground, although none of the lava that flew up on impact hit them. But the wind had been taken out of them nonetheless.  
  
As for Saddam, he wound up getting knocked down at the edge of the gigantic pool of lava next to the remains of the mountain. But as people that had fallen in kept trying to swim out of the burning substance, and the skeletal remains of the people Saddam put there years earlier was floating up, Saddam rose up from the ground and found himself to be okay. His headquarters however, was another matter. His WMD's were certainly completly gone now, the book of Purgatory spells was probably lost in the wreckage or had sunk in the lava, and most of his other possessions he needed to strike fear in God were gone. This was indeed quite a setback for the dictator....and one he wasn't planning to let go unpunished. He still had his sword in his holster. It was just a matter of finding the people he was going to use it on.  
  
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Just a couple of minutes before the mountain blew apart, a new guest had arrived in Purgatory. After remembering the two Purgatory spells thanks to Grandpa Marsh and after writing them down, Wendy had used the first spell to finally get herself into Purgatory. She arrived in one of the many desolate areas, and had just recently found the mountain from far away. Taking this to be Saddam's fortress, she ran over to face him, but when she got close enough she saw that the mountain had blow apart with everybody else. So she turned around and ran before any of the debris hit her and before the lava appeared. By the time the explosions were finished, she was relatively far away from being in danger, but she could see all the pools of lava and the people sinking into it. She even thought she saw her old original 4'th grade teacher trying to swim her way out of the giant hole in the ground. But she shrugged that off since it was starting to get through to her that Butters might have been in this accident. Or just as worse, so could Stan.  
  
It didn't look like either of them were in the lava pools, so that was a relief. Neither of them were surrounding the lava pools or running around in panic either, so searching there was out for now. She looked around every place she could lay her eyes on, until she gazed about a big rock that was sinking into a newly formed hole full of lava. Behind that rock were two bodies that were lying down on their stomachs, but they were moving around a little bit so it seemed like they were okay. As Wendy walked closer to get a better look, he noticed one of the two boys had a patch of blond hair on his head.....and the other had straight black hair she'd notice anywhere.  
  
In her intense emotional state, she barely brought herself to be able to softly ask, "Stan?"  
  
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Act IV, Scenes 4-5, and Act V, Scenes 1-3- the last scenes of the story- are coming August 9'th. 


End file.
